


Daginy

by ladytrollfishes (tangelotime)



Series: Standalone Character Drabbles [1]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Gen, and torture, warnings for mentions of suicide
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-19
Updated: 2018-11-19
Packaged: 2019-08-26 03:25:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 20
Words: 23,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16673797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tangelotime/pseuds/ladytrollfishes
Summary: Daginy: The teenaged hemorebel spy who just doesn't quit. They try to operate on their own moral code, try not to kill people and make a difference in a world that smacks them constantly.A bunch of tumblr drabbles.





	1. A Dark and Stormy Night

It was a dark and stormy night, and Daginy was really quite displeased. It had been a disappointing surprise when their pursuer chased them out into the rain- and even more unpleasant one when they appeared to have some sort of water based psionics. 

As it was, they could barely see the troll in front of them- the troll they had been tracking for the last two days. Mizani Yoruba, an orangeblood, they suspected of spying for the empire. 

Their palmhusk lay on the ground, waterlogged and useless, and Daginy was shoved up against the wall, their right hand frozen to the wall. It was not really an ideal situation. Mizani knew what they looked like, possibly knew why they were there- this was just bad all around. This sort of thing didn’t happen very often- usually they were able to complete their work undetected, and when they were caught, they could get away, or at the very least call for help. 

This was an unusual circumstance to say the least, and Daginy rather hoped it did not end with them lying dead somewhere in a dumpster. 

Mizani shoved them back into the wall again, spitting in their face as people hurried through the rain, which was also quite distracting. Daginy realized then, they hadn’t actually been paying attention to what Mizani was screaming.

“I, um, I’m sorry but could you say that again?” they said, wiping their glasses off with a shaking hand. “I wasn’t quite listening.”

Mizani took a step back glaring, then grabbed their collar and shook them. 

“You’ve got quite the smarmy little mouth you slippery little asshole,” she said, and slammed them into the wall. Daginy winced as the change in elevation twisted their frozen wrist. Their toes dangled above the ground, and they grasped her arm for support. Being short could really be trying. 

“All that flattery is going to go straight to my head,” Daginy said, squirming. She slammed them back into the wall, and they coughed. 

“Who the fuck sent you!” she yelled, grabbing their collar and shaking them. 

At least the very least, she wasn’t going straight for the death blow. She wanted information. Mizani pushed them back against the wall, waiting for an answer. Daginy didn’t answer, too rattled. 

Mizani moved back, just enough to shove her fist into their gut. Daginy doubled over, coughing and feeling a rise of nausea.

“I d-don’t know,” they lied. “I didn’t get a name, or a f-face.”

“Likely story,” Mizani spat. “Was it Risten? Damn it, I’ll kill her! She thinks I’m cheating doesn’t she?”

Cheating? Well, Daginy felt stupid. No spy would think someone following them had anything to do with quadrants. If they got killed over this, they would die again, of shame. 

Mizani shook them viciously, as though answers would come tumbling out. The sooner this stopped, the better. If she thought that she could get an honest answer out of them, she had another thing coming. 

“S-stop!” they cried out. “I’ll tell you!”

“She bribed me to watch you for a while. Tall, blue, right?”  Risten, they guessed, was the thin-faced blueblood they had seen kissing Mizani in the past couple of days. “I- I don’t have much, please don’t hurt me anymore.” Daginy let their voice crack on the word hurt. Begging always left a sour taste in their mouth, but sometimes it was necessary.

She scowled down at them, examining them, before drawing back and punching them again in the face. The back of their head cracked against the brick wall and Daginy saw stars. 

“Don’t let me see you again,” she hissed in their face before letting them drop to the ground, melting the ice. Daginy collapsed into a little pile, groaning loudly, mostly for effect as Mizani stalked off. 

When they felt as though she had gone far enough away, Daginy pushed themself up to a sitting and took their glasses off. That went better than expected, all things considered. They took a deep, shuddering breath and stood. 

Their head hurt, a dull pounding ache emanating from the back of their skull, but it didn’t feel like a concussion, at least. Their hand had a little frost bite, and they definitely had a bruise forming underneath their left eye. Nothing they had to go to Alnica with- they just had to find someplace relatively safe and dry so they could take care of it themself.

They made it two steps when their legs folded underneath them, shaking too badly to stand. 


	2. The Day Everything Changed. (again)

 

 

Flames. Your hive.. it was in flames. 

Your mouth doesn’t seem to work as you stumble backwards, as the blueblood approached. He must have followed you home.   
  
“Little dirteater thought they could hide behind the grey,” he taunts, smacking a leather whip into the palm of his hand. “That’ll teach you to sass me.” You can’t seem to focus on the threat, not with your home burning behind him.. your lusus– your lusus was in there.   
  
The blueblood raises his hand, and you spare a moment’s thought to throw light in his face. He yelps and stumbles back, just enough for you to plunge past him, into your burning hive. The heat presses on your face as you burst in and you bring your sleeve up to your face to keep from breathing too much smoke. You just needed to find your lusus and get out before you burned with everything else.  
  
You can’t spare a moment to mourn, as your your childhood home, where you had spent the last seven sweeps, crumbles around you. Your lusus– if she wasn’t already dead– you had to find her. The first room held your husktop and your games, your writing desk with the accumulated scribbles of the last week. The paper was already black, curling, as flames flickering up the sides of your desk.. It was your lusus’ least favorite room, with nothing to grip.   
  
The door to the next room was open, ajar, and you burst into your kitchen which was already well ablaze. Heat scorches your ankles and you notice your pants have caught fire. You beat at it with your hands, putting it out, wasting precious seconds. You dash over to the sink, and throw the tap the highest it can go, wasting more time, but maybe it’d save your life. You grab your dish towels and thrust them under the stream, then stuff them in your pocket, putting one over your face.  
  
It’s a good thing your hive is small. You run into your bedroom, and immediately spot your lusus, perched on top your bed side lamp that was slowly catching flame. Her mouth was open and her eyes were whirling, but you couldn’t hear the grumbling noise you knew she’d be making over the roar of the fire. Relief nearly knocks you off your feet but you’re more sensible than that. You need to get out. You hurry over, and grab her, fishing one of the damp clothes from her pocket and wrapping it around her.   
  
Above you, something creaks. You glance around, wildly, then a crack splits your ceiling. You throw yourself forward as your room collapses. Your lusus skids from your grasp and out of harm’s way, but it’s too late for you. Burning debris crashes onto your leg and you scream. Your lusus crawls back toward you, as you bite your lip so hard it bleeds, and tears bead at the corner of your eyes only to instantly evaporate.   
  
She places a padded foot on your face as you strain to pull yourself free from the debris. She’s too small to make it on her own.  You had to carry her if she was going to survive. Biting your lip and trying to ignore the flames licking at your clothes, you strain to pull free, wiggling the best you can until your foot pulls free from its shoe and pops out of the debris.   
  
It’s broken, or at least badly sprained, and your pants are well and truly on fire now, but you can’t take the time to feel the pain right now, otherwise the rest of the house would fall on your head. You grab your lusus and deposit her on your head, then scramble forward on all fours as fast as you can. At least it’s less smoky down here.   
  
The floor is burning, and it sets your pants and sleeves on fire, and blisters the palms of your hands but you don’t stop. You escape the kitchen just as it collapses, and you can see the finish line, into the cool darkness of the night. The ceiling of the last room creaks as you’re halfway across it, and in desperation, you force yourself to scramble to your feet, throwing yourself into the cold just as the last remains of your hive collapse.   
  
The cold pavement underneath you is the best thing you’ve ever felt, and you roll flat onto it, facing the night sky. You cough and fresh air flooded your lungs, and maybe that was the best thing you’ve ever felt. There was pain stinging through your every nerve and throbbing in your ankle, but you were alive, and so was your lusus.   
  
You don’t register the sound of footsteps till someone says, “So the rustie lives.”   
  
The highblood. Your eyes snap open, and you try to sit up but a boot presses on your chest and forces you back down.   
  
“Didn’t think you’d make it out again,” the subbjuglator says, his voice soft and sickeningly sweet as he presses down harder. “I’m glad you’re okay.”   
  
You grab his ankle, as you struggle to take breaths, trying to shove him off.  
  
“Tsk, tsk, tsk. What a disrespectful little lowblood.” He shakes his head. “Why don’t you do as your superiors tell you and die?”  
  
He pushes harder, and you feel your ribs creak. You feel your lusus patting your face. You couldn’t die now, not after having survived all that. You hold onto his ankle and uncaptcha your knife. He sees the flash of light and forces you down harder, and something cracks, just before you jam your knife into his calf, spraying you with dark blood. He howls and stumbles backward and you’re free for the moment. Air rushes back into your lungs and you struggle to focus. If you could only turn invisible–  
  
“Bitch!” he roars, and kicks you, sending you flying. You hit the pavement again with a grunt, the pain blurring your vision. There’s a waddling white blur on the pavement; your lusus. You left her behind and now the tiny white lizard scrambling towards you. At the very least the subbjugulator seems to be ignoring her. His eyes glittered in the firelight with anger as he approached, holding the knife you stuck in his leg. You cough, and roll over, but you can’t push yourself up. You have nothing. No strength, no focus, no weapons left.   
  
All there was left was to die, but at least you can go out stubbornly. It’s a stupid gesture, but you manage the strength to raise a fist and flip him off. It was only too bad your lusus would have to watch you go, but at least she might survive.   
  
He growls, infuriated by even the simplest gestures of insolence, and lunges.   
  
“Hey! Stop that!” Someone blurs onto the scene, and punches him in the face. There’s an obvious crunch and the subbjugulator falls to the ground. Your unexpected savior is a lowblood, yellow. She was on rollerblades, with twin blades strapped to her arms. Firelight flickers across her face, the shadows carving out the lines of cold anger down her cheekbones.   
  
“You have twenty seconds to justify yourself,” she declares, pointing at him.   
  
The blueblood wipes off his bloody nose and stands. He draws his whip. “I don’t have anything to say to you filth,” he says, and spits in her face.   
  
Your lusus manages to get to you, so you scoop her up in your hands and try to sit up. You don’t think you can run now though, as wounded as you are. If this lowblood loses, then you’re still dead.   
  
The highblood tosses your knife to the side and draws out a longer blade to pair with his whip. The lowblood narrows her eyes for a moment, but doesn’t move. Suddenly, her opponent yelps and drops the whip. It’s smoking slightly. Faster than you thought a person could move, the lowblood speeds forward in a burst of smoke and jams the point of her blade into his skull, with a crunch and squelch. 

It’s over, so much faster than you thought it would. You were afraid you might have had to watch her long, drawn out death.   
  
She yanks her arm from the dead body, and lets it collapse without ceremony, shaking off the bits of grey matter and dark blood as if it were dust. Her strife disappears back into her sylladex as she turns back towards you.   
  
She squats down and holds a hand out. “Hey,” she says softly, and you realize you’ve been cowering from her. “I’m Herlyn.”  
  
You lick your lips and try to talk, but your throat is completely dry. She uncaptchas a water bottle and unscrews the lid and taking a sip to show you it’s safe before handing it to you.  
  
“Don’t drink it too fast okay?” she says.   
  
You look down at the bottle, hesitating, then took a small sip. The water was cool and slid cleanly over your parched throat. You take another mouthful, trying to control yourself.   
  
“Daginy,” you croak between mouthfuls of water. “They/them please.”  
  
“Nice to meet you,” she says, “Only wish it could be in better circumstances. I’m going to help you okay? Is that your lusus?” She pointed to the lizard you cradled in your arm.   
  
You look down and nod. Your lusus was reaching for the water bottle so you cup your hand and pour a little in it for her.   
  
“We need to get you somewhere safe,” she says, “You look pretty badly hurt, so I’m going to carry you okay? It’s my moirail’s place.”  
  
You hesitate for a moment. You barely know this troll. But she was offering you some semblance of safety, and it wasn’t like you had anywhere else to go. The still burning ruins of your hive wouldn’t in the background wouldn’t let you forget it. So you nod, and she scoops you up.   
  
“They’ll come after me for his murder,” you murmur and rest your head on her chest. She’s really a lot taller than you. “He burned my hive down.”  
  
“Hey hey, we’ll figure it out when we come to it,” Herlyn says, rubbing her thumb in circles on your shoulder. “Right now, let’s just get you somewhere safe.” 

 


	3. A Memory That May Or May Not Have Happened

A memory that may or may not have happened:

Being hiveless was… hard. Maybe not harder than you imagined- your imagination proved pretty accurate- but it was definitely different imagining it than living it.

You were still living on charity- you were supposed to be dead. The minor stipend you got as a kid of the empire was closed to you, and every account you had was gone. Alnica gave you her old clothes and Ferra, well. Ferra taught you how to pick pockets and locks, though not without a lot of arguing. They could be so incredibly condescending for someone supposedly uninterested in your life.

Really, you were lucky that they were so kind to you, and you needed to start getting work done. Still, it was difficult to be at all productive when you were always on the look out for dry places to sleep, for ways to disappear, for things you needed to care for your lusus, when you were tired, hungry, and, every so often, damp.

The day is coming, the sky just starting to tint red with the sunrise and you hurry back to the abandoned construction site you slept in the previous day. It hadn’t been a good sleep- you were consequently exhausted- but it was at least enclosed and dry.

You step past the caution tape and head up the stairs, duck onto the balcony by the side of the door and climb into the half opened window that lead into a dusty old office with papers scattered across the floor. You trudge, exhausted, to the place you had slept yesterday, a small nest of rotting insulation in a corner. The smell kept waking you up, sure, but it was a pile, and a soft pile even. Yawning, you take your lusus from your collar and give her a stroke when you turn the corner and nearly drop her.

Oily black goo leaks from the unfinished ceiling dripping onto the remains of your insulation pile. It bubbles and writhes not unlike a living thing, eating at what served as your coon, slowly oozing out to cover the whole room.

You’ve never seen anything like it, but you don’t know if you want to find out more and you definitely don’t want to sleep here any more. You’ll brave the sun to find something else. You back away quickly, clutching your lusus to your chest. Maybe you squeeze a little too hard, maybe she’s scared too, because she chirps and the goo immediately spasms.

You turn to run, but the oily blackness runs between you and the door and washes up in a wave. It pools at your feet, the four corners of the room oozing goo as you back away from it. You make your way to the center of the clean circle of the floor even as it grows smaller and smaller.

“What-” you manage to say, your mouth dry. “What’s going on?”

The goo pauses in its flow, then trembles so hard the floor underneath you shakes.

“Delicious.” The room vibrates with the word. It’s vibrating against the surface to make sound, you realize distantly. “You.”

“Ah,” you mutter, your bloodpusher pounding in your ears. You only officially died a perigee ago. Shame you’d die again so soon. “So you’re going to eat me. Comforting.”

“Misery,” it says. “Delicious. You.”

Not the most coherent thing you’ve ever heard but you get the point. The goo starts rising rapidly, closing in around your ankles, making them curiously numb. You start to slog your way to the door, but then goo seeps into your shoes, your socks, your bones, numbing everything until you can’t feel one foot in front of another. The blackness is an enveloping void you can’t escape.

You’re not tall- it’s not long before the goo comes up to your neck. You whisper an apology to your lusus as you raise her above your head and watch the black goo inch up past your chin, pool into your mouth, rise over your nose and swallow your eyes.

—-

You wake up, sprawled on the floor. The sounds of the working night waft through the open window, and your lusus sits on your chest.

You insulation pile is gone and there’s no sign of black goo.


	4. Get to Know Your Doctor

You really hate the rain. It’s a cold drizzle too, which is only one step above a downpour, and so you find shelter at a small cafe, huddled just inside the awning out front where it was less likely for the staff to ask you to buy something or leave. 

The streets are near empty now, with the rain. It makes Mysmus easy to pick out when he walks by. He doesn’t notice you, which is a bit of a relief to be honest. 

He’s focused solely on the troll in front of him, a seadweller who hasn’t seemed to notice he picked up a tail. He’s not wearing a coat, even in this weather, and bears no emblem of his sign. His hands are at his side, open, his shoulders tense and ready to act. He walks with a predator’s grace, quiet, until he turns into an alley, following the seadwellers. 

You know a warpath when you see one. 

You glance around, but the other passerby are involved in their own affairs walking by with their eyes fixed down on the pavement or on their palmhusks or running for shelter. No one else has noticed. 

 It takes you a second to decide, then you leave your shelter and follow him. He doesn’t make it hard on you, as focused as he is on the seadweller. The rain hides the sounds of your foot steps and it’s a simple matter to keep just out of his line of sight. 

The seadweller starts calling out, noticing, finally that he’s being followed, heading back and beating the bushes for his pursuer. Mysmus keeps out of line of sight, and you duck back behind the corner. A fire escape presents itself next to you, and you grab onto an air conditioner and pull yourself up to the ladder. You’re half way up the roof, as quietly as you can when a shot rings out. 

You freeze a moment, then steal your way onto the roof and look down into the alley just in time to see Mysmus fire a second shot into the seadweller’s head. The look on his face softens into a satisfied smile as he captchalogues the gun and turns away. 

A moment later, you dare to take a breath, staring down at the corpse of the seadweller. The poor fool. 

You knew there was something dangerous about Mysmus, but you hadn’t quite suspected it was something like this. Cold-hearted killer he was, even as he could tend to you with gentle hands. There was something going on with Mysmus, and you were pretty certain you could use it. 


	5. Processing a Ghost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This takes place in the aftermath of a thread where Daginy walked into a haunted house and was immediately possessed by the ghost of a highblood trapped in a locket that was absolutely going to steal their body.

“You need me,” you snarl, struggling against the twine binding you hands and ankles and nailed to the floor. Braided spiritgum root, probably, to keep you from doing any magic. A chalk circle surrounds you, sigils for protection, preservation. 

A grinning face leers down at you, a familiar face. You snarl at her, the anger of betrayal biting and sharp. 

 "Of course we do,“ she says, surrounded by your clam and holding up a familiar necklace. “But you’re too dangerous, Ashevi. You can live but we’ll have to compromise." 

 You wake with a start, in a corner of Hester’s hive in a cold sweat. 

"Daginy, Daginy, Daginy,” you chant under your breath as you test your hands. They’re still under your control, but a paranoid thought still occurs to you– she might still be in there, waiting for a good moment to take back over. 

You didn’t realize, at first, that you had been possessed. There had been a million other things on your mind and an extra one slipped in unnoticed. She hadn’t taken away your perception of your body, just most of your control, and she had so seamlessly integrated herself, you had trouble telling what was you and what was something else. 

Closing your eyes, you go looking for her again. There’s not a whisper of her any more but she obviously left something behind. You’d be willing to bet you’ll dream more of her life in the coming days. You’re not quite ready to go back to sleep just yet. Instead, you take out one of your little notebooks, and start writing. 

  * Daginy Chamae, Eight sweeps, Hemoanon. Hemorebel. Spy. Writer.


  * Cares so much it hurts. Pacifist. Murderer. 


  * Quiet, bold, stubborn, careful, reckless idiot. 



 You don’t know how you feel about your list having this many contradictions, but at least it’s yours, all these things you know about you. 

You close your eyes again. You always figured ghosts existed, even if you’ve never seen the proof. You’ve met a lot of lowbloods who’ve all claimed they can see or hear them, some of them knowing things only the dead know. 

Magic? Possession? That was something else. A group of cultists that had someway to force people out of their bodies, spin otherworldly things into existence. Even Hester, with the knowledge to stop you from getting possessed. 

You’re kind of surprised you haven’t stumbled across this sort of thing earlier, but at least that means it’s rare. You want to be prepared for the next time something like this happens. 

You hesitate a moment and then take your pen to your hand. You draw one circle, and then another inside. You draw sigils for protection, life, mortality, identity. An anti-possession rune. 

There’s a faint swish in your ears as you feel the last bits of Ashevi leave you.

 _Not you_. You draw another circle inside the rune and in it, you write a sigil for knowledge. Ashevi might have taken your body but her mind will help you keep it in the future. 

You get started. You grab one of the notebooks you’ve stockpiled and write down everything Ashevi knew, jotting down sigils, recipes for rituals, magical theory, supernatural dangers and ingredients. It comes to you in bits and pieces and you have to split things up between notebooks, numbering the pages and referencing things as they come to you, like you’re remembering something on your own rather than plumbing another memory. 

The sun sets and you’re still not done but you need rest. You look back at the work you’ve already done, words you commit to your own memory, not your borrowed one. 

Hester will probably let you stay awhile, especially if you share some of this stuff with them, you can afford to take a break. You slap a bandage on top of the rune on your hand to protect the ink and sink back into the pile. You’re going to master this before the week is out.


	6. Don't Leave Me Alone

You’ve got a fever, you’re sweating, you’re cold. You can’t breath properly either. You’ve got a sickness trapped in your skin and there’s really nothing you can do because you can’t fight or blackmail or undo a sickness, and that’s your entire tool kit. Also you’re more tired than you ever remember being before.

Mysmus has you wrapped up in a blanket on the couch as he pours soup from a can onto the stovetop.

You hate being sick with a passion. Well you would, if you could up with the strength. Instead you just cough, shaking your whole body and draining your strength. All you can think about is how tired you are, when you really should be managing things, running your projects, making sure people don’t get killed.

Mysmus already confiscated your palmhusk and it’s a testament to how sick you are that you didn’t immediately take it back.

It’s also a testament to how much you trust him that you’re not freaking out about it still being in his possession. You don’t really wanna think about that right now.

He comes back with the bowl of soup, peering down worriedly at you. You squint right back. Your glasses lie on the coffee table and you are a blind motherfucker without them.

“Anisen, how are you feeling?” He says, sitting at the table. He’s holding out a spoonful of soup ready to feed you like a wriggler but you’re not so far gone as to needing babysitting.

You push yourself upright and stick your hands out to take the bowl. He doesn’t insist you lie back down, but drops the spoon back in.

“Fine,” you croak and pointedly ignore the disparity between what you say you are and what you look like.

He sighs as he hands you the bowl.

“Careful,” he says. “It’s hot.”

“Well it’s not like my hands aren’t already used to that,” you joke. The burn scars on your hands really do keep you cushioned from low level heat.

You feel like you get a look for the comment, but you can’t quite see.

“Here’s your medicine,” he says, showing you two dark pills, folding them into a napkin and putting the packet on the table. He hands you another one. “Take this one now, and the other two every four hours.”

The bowl wobbles when you take it and Mysmus helps you hold it steady. You hold the pill between your teeth and take the bowl again, taking a large swallow of the soup. There. Meds taken. One ordeal over with.

“Drink lots of fluids okay?” Mysmus says. “If you get hungry again there’s more soup on the stove, just turn up the heat.”

He’s fiddling with something at his side, a bag, he’s checking in. You watch, half listening as you scoop soup into your mouth.

He checks his watch. “I should be back at like 9,” he says. “I’m going to give you back your palmhusk but I’ve turned it off. I only want you to turn it on if you need me alright?”

You nod dumbly, still trying to juggle eating and thinking at the same time.

He stands to leave when it occurs to you– he’s leaving. He has his own day to attend to.

You don’t know why it surprises you. He’s a doctor with other patients, and it was obvious you couldn’t just take up his clinic space, but– 

you are weak and vulnerable and without the strength to fend off the shadows, you are afraid they will swallow you whole.

“Mysmus, wait-” you start, reaching out and snagging the corner of his coat. The soup bowl slips in your hands but you catch it before it spills more than a little on the blankets. He stops and waits for you to finish your sentence.

  _Please don’t leave me alone._

It’s a stupid request. He has patients to take care, people whose lives depend on him. What was he going to do around all day? Sit next to you and watch you sleep? It’s not even like you’re unused to being alone. You can’t even say what demons Mysmus’ presence are fending off, and what exactly you’re afraid of. 

What’s worse is that you’re not sure he’d refuse you if you’d ask. What would happen to his patients then? What would happen to him, if he was so attached to you?

“Anisen?” he says, crouching back down. “You okay?” 

He doesn’t even know your damn name. 

“…just come back, okay?” you manage to say instead. “Come back alive.”

He reaches out with a hand and pulls short of actually touching you. Instead his fingers tangle in the edge of your blanket. You let go of his coat and retreat, and he smiles a blurry smile. 

“I’ll be careful, I promise,” he says. “I’m just going to the clinic, okay?”

“Right,” you grumble, acutely aware the words coming out of your mouth are half nonsense. “I’ll see you soon.”

Mysmus moves off and sweeps through the front door. It locks from the other side, and you spot movement from the window moving away, and you’re alone again in the darkness. 


	7. Move On

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A collection of four drabbles where Daginy, in one way or another, moves on.

 

**Herlyn: Say goodbye.**

 “You’re sure you want to do this?” Alnica’s voice is quiet at your side. Daginy shifts, peering up at the both of you and adjusting their glasses.

 They’re so small, honestly. You remember seeing that little figure crumpled on the street with a boot on their chest. The task they’re taking on is huge in comparison. You’re not sure you should let them go through with this.

 “Yeah,” they say, adjusting their glasses. “Are you sure you want to do it?”

 They’ve got a steely look in their eye, and you remember that the little figure also flipped the bird at a charging highblood.

 Alnica nods. “Of course,” she says. There isn’t a trace of hesitation in her voice. You know though, she has doubts about Daginy’s side of the bargain. You’ve discussed it into daylight, between the two of you, but Daginy, Daginy wouldn’t hear word of it.

 They no longer had an identity, they said. They didn’t have a hive. They didn’t have anything that would have tied them to a regular life. It was a huge blow, yes, but this was a chance for them to turn it into an opportunity.

 You’d have to tie them up and throw them in the closet to make them stay, and Alnica already said no.

 “It’ll be okay,” Daginy says. “I can’t live on your couch forever either.”

 “True,” Alnica says with a nod. “But be careful out there.”

 “We’ll be right here if you need anything, bud,” you say, pulling Alnica close to you. “You just let us know okay?”

 They nod and smile at you.

 “I’ll be in touch,” they say, and turn to leave. You sigh as you lean your face against Alnica’s horn.

 “I hope they don’t immediately get themself killed,” you say.

 Alnica puts a hand over yours. “Think more positively please,” she says. She’s got her eyes fixed on Daginy’s fast retreating back. She’s worried, you can tell. You shouldn’t make it worse.

 You start steering her back into the apartment and she sighs. “We’re really doing this, huh?” she says.

 You press a kiss to her horn. “Yup,” you say. “Together. Every step of the way.

  **Ferra: Confront the instigator**

 You run to catch up to Daginy. It’s sheer chance you see them at all, on the busy sidewalk.

 “Hey!” you yell. “Hey, wait up!”

 They turn to look at you, and there’s a moment of confusion on their face before they scan the crowd. Alnica and Herlyn aren’t here though, and you’re glad for it. You need to talk to them alone.

 You grab them by the arm and start steering them away from the crowded street.

 “Let’s find somewhere more private to talk, yeah?” you say.

“I feel like I’m being kidnapped,” Daginy quips, giving you a wary glance but follows along anyway.

 You find an alleyway that’s sufficiently quiet. You pull them against the wall and keep a lookout on anyone passing by.

 “I wouldn’t have taught you how to pick locks if I knew you were going to be doing this,” you whisper harshly. “Robbery is one thing, but treason? You’re going to get yourself killed.”

 Daginy stares up at you.

 “Seriously?” they say. “Right here?”

 “Well I’m not bringing you hive and you don’t have one,” you say irritably. “Loud enough here to keep people from listening in.”

 They consider that and nod.

 “Okay fine,” they say. “But still. Who even told you?”

 “Herlyn can’t lie worth jackshit,” you say. At least to you. “You’re going to get her and Alnica killed too. Did you eat sopor as a wrigger or something ‘cause this little crusade you’re going on here is endangering everyone around you.”

You lean over them, one hand on your hip, the other poking at their presumably hole filled pan. You’ve never met anyone so smart, and yet so entirely stupid. 

Daginy stares back at you with a surprising amount of animosity. 

 “Herlyn and Alnica are big girls,” they say, putting a hand on your shoulder and pushing you away.. “They can make their own decisions, and so can I.” They pull their arm from your grip. “If you have a problem with what they’re doing, take it up with them.”

 “I’ve got a problem with what you’re doing too, idiot,” you hiss. “You’ll just die in a few months, and then what? Nothing you’ve done will be worth anything then.”

 “Thanks for the faith,” they snap right back. “What else am I going to do, huh? Get a new hive? Get a regular job? I’m supposed to be dead.”

 “I’m not saying you go straight,” you say. “But do things that are at least slightly less illegal than espionage.”

 They stare you dead in the eye.

 “ _No_.”

 They take a step back and stuff their hands in their pockets.

 “You’re not changing my mind, Ferra,” they say. “Take it up with Herlyn and Alnica if you have a problem with them going along with me.”

 They take two steps backward and disappear around a corner.

 —-

**Alnica: Care for your flock.**

 There’s a knock at your door. You’re not expecting anyone, but you leap to your feet anyway. You haven’t seen Daginy in a few perigees.

 Ever since they found a tech guy who was on board with the whole hemorebel business, they had limited in-person visits and instead sent encrypted emails from dummy addresses with what they were up to.

 If they were here in person, they needed something. They almost never called ahead. When you open the door however, it’s Herlyn. She’s holding her shoulder, she’s got a bloody nose, and she’s quickly developing a black eye.

 “Herlyn!” you exclaim, stepping aside and letting her limp in.

 As soon as the door shuts behind you, the illusion disappears, and you find yourself looking up at empty space. When you look down, it  _is_  Daginy, holding their shoulder, with a bloody nose and a black eye.

 “Sorry about that,” they say. “Didn’t want to show up without a disguise.”

 You blink, startled, then collect yourself. They need care. You step forward and guide them to the couch.

 “I think my shoulder’s dislocated?” they say.

 “What happened?” you ask as you help them take off their coat. Yeah, that’s a dislocation. Their arm is hanging from the socket oddly.

 “I was listening in on that pickpocket ring when one of them saw me,” they say. “Grabbed me by my arm and slammed me up against the wall.”

 You feel your bloodpusher drop. You knew that this was going to be a part of the job, but knowing it is different than seeing Daginy bruised up in front of you. 

 Herlyn ran around and got her butt kicked all the time, but Herlyn walked into fights. You were always pretty sure the other trolls walked away worse for wear than she did. Daginy walked into beatings.

 “Alnica?” they say, and you realize you’ve paused.

 “Sorry,” you say. “Yeah, that’s a dislocation. I’m going to need to pop it back in, and then you should rest that shoulder for at least a few weeks.”

 They nod, and brace themself for the pain. You shift in your seat and in one motion, you slide the bone back into it’s socket. Daginy only grunts, but you can see the tightness in their face.

 “I don’t have a few weeks,” they say. “There’s a subbjuggulator party happening over the weekend and I need to figure out the key players I-”

 “You’re sneaking into the circus?” you whisper hushed. “You can’t-”

 They shake their head.

 “No, I can,” they say. “See?” White flickers over their face and suddenly a clown grins at you on the couch from where Daginy was just sitting.

 “Handmaid help us,” you sigh, and they flicker back.

 “I’ll be fine,” they say. “I’m being careful.”

 You don’t say anything else, but pull out a length of bandage.

 “Party or no,” you say, “I don’t want you moving this arm.”

 They sigh as you wrap them up in a sling so their movement is restricted. You get the feeling the only reason they’re tolerating this is because they know you’d insist.

 “I’ll be fine,” they say. “I can work around the arm. Turns out I’m pretty good at this you know.”

 You pause for a moment before you go back to work. You can tell they don’t want to worry you, but you just want to make sure they stay alive.

 “I worry because I care,” you say. “I don’t like seeing you hurt. But if you’re going to be doing this kind of thing I need to know you’re taking care of yourself, okay?”

 They have their face turned away from you when they say, “Yeah, okay.”

 —-

**Daginy: Be Okay.**

 You can’t put it off any longer. You can’t, in good conscience, carry your lusus around with you any more. The missions you’ve been receiving are getting longer, harder, more dangerous. You’re good at your job sure, but there’s always a chance you make a mistake.

 You’re having a hard time getting her the warmth she needs in the coming winter months, and you just can’t guarantee her safety anymore.

 She curls up in your collar, putting her slow mitten hand on your chin as you knock. You’ve developed the habit of changing your appearance whenever you come here so Alnica looks like she has friends who aren’t you or Herlyn.

 Alnica opens the door and lets you in without comment. She’s seen this disguise of yours before.

 “Daginy,” she says. It’s been awhile since you’ve heard your name, to be honest. You missed it.

 You dissipate the illusion.

 “Alnica,” you say. Herlyn’s sitting behind her on the couch and when she turns to look at you, she jumps to her feet.

 “Daginy!” she exclaims and rushes over to you, arms outstretched. You let her grab you up in a hug, but you tense enough that she drops you pretty fast. “Hey, it’s been forever!” She leans forward to look at you and you have to take a step back.

 It’d been too long since you’d come back. You forgot how much Herlyn could be.  Or what a hug felt like, to be honest. Herlyn, though, steps back, looking hurt.

 You bite your lip, feeling guilty. “I uh,” you stutter. “Sorry?”

 You glance at Alnica who’s peering at you too.

 “Are you okay?” she asks you gently. You don’t like feeling like some scared lusus she needs to talk down.

 “I uh, I just need my space,” you say. All the scrutiny makes you itch. That’s usually when you need to get the heck outta there, but this wasn’t random people. This was Herlyn and Alnica. “I’m fine.”

 “Well why don’t we get settled first?” Alnica suggests and starts waving everyone towards the couches. “I’ll get some food.”

 Herlyn plops herself on the couch, arms folded, somewhat unhappy, you suppose, at you, for being less than responsive. You wish you knew how to talk to her about it. Blackmail and coercion was easier than this.

You sit in silence until Alnica returns with some sandwiches, which you’re pretty thankful for. You grab one and stow it in your pocket before you take one to eat.

 “So how have you been?” Alnica asks.

 “I’m fine,” you say through a mouthful of food. You wipe the crumbs on your sleeve. “This is really good, by the way.”

 “I saw in your last report we lost a member,” she prods.

“Oh yeah,” you say, faltering. “I- yeah. It wasn’t good. Had to leave him behind.”

 You push yourself back into the couch. The mission was a success, but it was at a high cost. You took the information you wanted, but your exit plan had gone awry and you had to fight your way out. He played decoy– he was better in a fight, and you were always great at running away.

 “Daginy?” Alnica says again, and you start and look at her. “Are you okay?”

 “I’m fine,” you say. The look she gives you says she doesn’t believe you. Herlyn doesn’t either, but at least she’s not crossing her arms anymore. She’s leaning forward, elbows on her knees, her arms draping down to the floor. “I’m not here about that though. I need to ask you a favor.”

 “What do you need?”

 You put down your sandwich before you reach into your collar and pull out your lusus.

 “Can you take care of her?” you ask. “I probably should have asked about it earlier, but you know, I uh, I didn’t want to say goodbye.” 

Your lusus grips your finger a little more tightly than usual and you kind of clutch at her. You still don’t want to say goodbye.

 “Are you sure?” Alnica leans forward, looking concerned. “You’ll be alone out there.”

 “Yeah,” you say with a nod. “I can’t make sure she’s safe if she’s with me. She deserves better than this.”

 “So do you,” she says quietly, but you pretend not to hear. She reaches her hands out to take your lusus, but your mom doesn’t exactly want to let go of your fingers. It takes a bit of detangling before she’s safely in Alnica’s hands.

 “Thanks,” you say, a knot in your throat. “It uh, means a lot. And uh, the sandwiches were good.”

 Alnica spends some time grappling with your lusus. When she’s finally settled on her fingers, you give her a little goodbye wave and stand.

 “Well, I shouldn’t overstay my welcome,” you say. “Thanks again.” If you stay longer you might not want to leave.

 Alnica stands too. “Nonsense,” she says. “You’re welcome to stay as long as you need.”

 “This is bullshit,” Herlyn says finally. “Stop pretending you’re okay.”

 You turn to look at her. She’s standing too, arms crossed again, with her hair is blowing in the invisible winds that always kicked up about her when she was upset.

 “You can’t just come in here, drop off your lusus, tell us everything is fine, and you’re fine,” she exclaims, tossing her hands in the air. “Do I have to remind you that that’s the lusus you ran back into a burning building to save? You can’t just ditch her and expect us to believe you’re just okay with it.”

 You blink, astonished, and turn to look at Alnica. She’s looking at Herlyn, exasperated, but when she looks at you, she doesn’t disagree, her mouth pressed into a worried line.

 You wet your lips and look back at Herlyn.

 “I um- I’m not okay with it but-”

 “Then don’t do it!” she blurts out, throwing her hands up. “Take a break! Goddammit Daginy, do something for yourself once in awhile why don’t you? You don’t always have to do the right thing!”

 You can’t help the jab of fear from the outburst, but that makes you feel ungrateful. Herlyn’s not trying to hurt you, but she is talking about is a life you’ve left entirely behind, because what you have in front of you is work, important work and a lot of it, and you intend to get through as much of it as possible before you die.

You do take small breaks when you need them, but there is no one who does your job like you do, and if you don’t do it, people suffer. You can’t put down everything at a whim.

 But you get why she’s angry– she cares, she really does, and you feel a strong rush of affection for her. It makes a grub of you, soft and baby tender, and you can’t stomach it for more than a minute.

 “It’s okay,” you say softly, holding your hands out, palms and scars up, fingers soft.  “It’s okay, really.” Herlyn stares down at you, anger fading into something akin to confusion.

 Tears bead up in the corner of your eyes as you try to figure out how to make her understand why you can’t– why you don’t need–

 “This is as okay as I’ll ever be,” you say tightly. “I knew that when I started this, okay? I’m okay.”

 You’re making a spectacle of yourself. You can’t quite look Alnica or Herlyn in the eye, and you nod at them both.

 “I do have to go,” you say. “Thank you both, really. I–” your voice falters again. “I really can’t explain how much I owe you guys.” 

Alnica says “Wait-” but you don’t. You pull a trick you’ve figured out, where you leave your image where it is a second or two after you move, and make it halfway to the door before they’ve even realized you’ve moved.

 You step through the door and make a run for it. It’s what you’re good at, after all.


	8. No Fire Here

You grab his hand without thinking, pulling him back around the corner, out of sight. 

“Be patient,” you hiss. “You go out there now, they’ll find you. Wait it out.”

He looks back at you, fear written all over his face. It’s his first time out past when a curfew has been set. Some fool heiress had declared herself the new Empress with a tidy number of followers and now the manhunt was on. Last you checked, a dozen of them had been caught and killed already. 

Now the work you had to do was all the much harder because some fish had to have her ego popped. 

“They patrol by section,” you whisper. “We’re at the border of section b-24, and so we just move over there where they’re done with it and start searching this one. Trust me, this is one of the safest places to be right now.”

When curfews were set, hiveless trolls got swept up into it too. Walking away from that was always a crap shoot. Sometimes you got lucky. It was always a dangerous time, and you’d have to check on a few people after this. 

Mysmus squeezes your hand, and you realize you’re still holding his. His hand is a little clammy. His blood is cooler than yours, but also you think it’s because he’s very nervous. 

“Let’s sit,” you say, tugging him down. You make your seat on the dirty cold concrete, but that’s fine. If someone comes by before schedule, you don’t want to leave anything behind. 

You let go of his hand to sit yourself properly on the ground, but when Mysmus settles next to you, he reaches for it again. You oblige him. You remember the first time you were out after a curfew and really, decent company would have been nice. 

Mysmus has a good grip on your hand and adjusts it every once in awhile. The two of you sit in silence for a long time. 

Then, Mysmus turns your palm upward in his, his thumb running over the slight ridges of the burn scars on your hands. They’re old and faded now, the tissues slightly darker than the rest of your skin. 

“If you don’t mind me asking,” he says, hushed. “What happened?”

You blink. The floor was on fire and you couldn’t walk. A piece of ceiling had fallen on your leg. Smoke at least, was thinner near the ground, but you would smell it on yourself even days afterward. If you didn’t get out, you and your lusus, who was clinging for dear life to your hair, would die, nameless victims to a highblood’s pride. 

“It was a long time ago,” you say instead, into the chill. “It’s not important.”

It’s not true. That’s not true at all. Mysmus shifts next to you, and falls silent because he knows a evasion when he hears it, but you don’t want to- to- 

“To what?” he says, and you realize you may have muttered a thing or two out loud. 

“Um,” you say. “I mean- I mean, uh, it is important, but I, uh-”

“You don’t want to talk about it,” he finishes for you and you nod. You can’t look at him. 

He gives your hand another squeeze, this one meant to be comforting you. 

“Don’t worry about it,” he says. “Only if you want to share.”

You nod again and adjust your grip. You sit. You hold hands.

The cold seeps through the concrete through your pants and into your bones. You put your free hand against the ground until it feels numb. 

There is no fire here. 


	9. Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mysmus says it, Daginy freaks out.

You ran, you definitely ran. You had.. no idea what to do, and removing yourself from that situation as soon as possible was.. probably the right thing to do. 

You’re honestly not sure. You didn’t actually look back at Mysmus when you booked it, but you can’t imagine he was very happy about it. You’re not unused to people confessing all sorts of things to you, but you usually.. planned those out. You knew what they expected and you could react accordingly.

This was very, very different. Usually people spoke to your different identities, not… you. 

You hug your knees, curled up on the ledge you had found in the mountain’s tunnels. You liked the capacity to get lost in them, but you don’t think Mysmus would follow you– he was usually pretty good with respecting your space, and you really kind of need it right now. 

He said he loves you. The thought fills you with some weird apprehension, you don’t know how to deal with. Usually, when someone made a confession you didn’t have the capacity to deal with, it was as easy as shedding an identity and leaving them in the dust. You can’t exactly do that here, and you were… entirely at a loss. 

You hear footsteps in the cavern, and instantly you camouflage yourself in the darkness and freeze. You can’t talk to him yet. 

“Daginy?” It’s Ferra. You stay quiet. “I know I’m not going to find you if you don’t want to be found, but I did see you run in here like your feet were on fire so.” You can hear her draw nearer to your corner. “I wanted to make sure you were okay?”

You and Ferra are hardly the kind of friends who told each other your deepest worries. You brushed black with them after all, not red, not even close to pale. But you think whatever black feelings they’ve had or whatever has probably complicated with how you’ve been lately.

At the same time, Ferra was a lot better than you at this kind of stuff, and you… had no idea what to do, only that you had to do… something.

“Please tell me you’re actually in here and I didn’t chase an illusion,” they say as the bobbing light of a flashlight passes into view and Ferra herself shortly afterward. “Daginyyyyyyy.” She just passes you when you finally speak up.

“Here.”

There’s a clatter and a swear as they drop the flashlight. “Daginy I swear to  _fuck_ ,” she says as she doubles back to look at you, shining the flashlight in your face. You squint back at her, holding up your hand against the light. “I fucking hate it when you do that.”

You don’t say anything, but dim the light on her flashlight so you can actually look at her.

“What happened?” Ferra asks, propping a hand on their hip and raising an eyebrow.

You look down, lick your lips then meet her eyes again.

“Um,” you say. “Mysmus– Mysmus told me he loves me?” You say it like a question- like maybe Ferra will snort and deny it ever happened and it’ll turn out to be a delusion or something.

Instead, Ferra raises an eyebrow and cocks her head as if she’s expecting you to continue. “Is that it?” she says, and you nod.

“And you were surprised?” they say. “Honestly for someone so smart, you’re really stupid. The dude dropped everything to follow you the minute he saw you needed help.”

When she puts it like that, you do feel a little stupid.

“I didn’t, ah,” you say, hesitant. “I didn’t think about it that way.”

“Of course you didn’t,” they say. “And I don’t suppose you thought about whether or not you love him too?”

You stare back at her, feeling heat rise to your cheeks but immediately casting an illusion to make sure Ferra can’t see. “Uh, not really?” you say.

She doesn’t say anything but give you a look, and you take the awkward pause to think about it. Do you? What did that even mean?

“If you need help,” she says, her tone decidedly more gentle. “The fact you couldn’t ditch him like you’ve done with basically everyone else says something. Like I’m a hundred percent positive you’re only sticking with us is because we pulled you out of that hellhole and you’re too hurt to do anything else.”

“Um,” you say, feeling somewhat attacked. She was a hatefriend, after all. It’s true though. If you weren’t… and you hadn’t– you would have probably left them already and gone back to work. “Uh, I uh, think I need some- some time.”

“Sure,” Ferra says. “Have fun figuring it out.” They stand, and sidle back outwards. “You have  _friends_ , you know. You can ask us for help.”

You huddle against the rock, listening to yourself breath until Ferra leaves the cavern. You haven’t actually considered what you want since, well, Mysmus asked to come along. And before that moment, you’re honestly not sure. It’s like stretching a muscle you hadn’t moved in days.

You’re going to be in this cave figuring out what to do next for a good long while, huh.


	10. Story Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Something Fun and Feel Good. So obviously its only like 300 words

The tealblood looks up at you, their front two wriggler teeth still missing, slowly, their face spreads out into a wide grin. 

“You did it?” Tinima ask. “You really did it?” 

You grin back down at them, nodding almost incredulously. “Yeah,” you say, nodding. “They’re really gone.” 

“Yay!” they exclaim, and grab you by the hand without hesitation and start pulling you towards their hive. “You gotta tell everyone about it okay?” 

You nod, still grinning, trotting along after the wriggler until you reach their hive. They throw the door open and burst through. 

A small crowd of kids turn to look at you, the oldest can’t be more than 6 sweeps. There’s a tense ripple before they 

“Pillam said they did it!” Tinima crows and instantly there’s a surge of wrigglers climbing their feet, and a tiny chorus of “yay!”s

The smallest of them crowd around you for hugs and you find yourself laughing as you pat the kids on the back. A couple of the older ones are staring at you with big eyes. 

“How did you do it?” one of them asks. “You gotta tell us.”

“Story time!” one of the younger ones cry, and you can’t help but laugh as a dozen little hands pull you towards the couch. 

“Okay okay,” you say, raising your hands. “I’ll tell you.”

You’ll leave out some of the more illegal stuff you did, to be perfectly honest. You don’t need these wrigglers trying to copy you out there. 

“So getting a clown cult out of anywhere they sit in isn’t exactly easy,” you begin. “You really gotta know what’s going on in there..”


	11. Lystic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The story of why Daginy's hemoanon

You’re four and you’re having fun.

“Nu-uh,” you crow, throwing down your card. It’s shiny holographic Fisheul and it has 120 HP. And like three attacks. “Look I win!”

“No way!” Lystic says, throwing his hand up. “My Braehnun is resistant to water type attacks!”

“No it’s not, you cheater!” you exclaim and throw your handful of cards at him. He shrieks with laughter and throws his own at you and you jump at him. He scrambles out of the way, and you give chase laughing.

You pounce and you all crash into the coffee table, sending it and all the fiduspawn cards sprawling to the ground.

“Ow!” Lystic cries from under you and you scramble off of him. He’s face first on the floor and you shake him by the shoulder.

“Are you okay?” you exclaim. He pushes himself up, shaking his head.

“Yeah,” he says, but when he looks up at you his nose has a smear of something sunbright yellow. It takes you just long enough for Lystic to touch his nose and start, to realize it’s blood.

He’s staring at you, his eyes wide as he whispers, “You won’t tell anyone right?”

You shake your head.

“Is that why you wear grey?” you whisper back, and he nods.

“Why don’t you wear yellow?” you ask. “Then people won’t ask what color you are at all.”

You asked him about it when you first met and he said he didn’t want to talk about it so you were confused but you didn’t push.

“I don’t wanna lie,” he says. “So I’m not.”

It’s starting to sink it in. If anyone finds out Lystic is off spectrum, he’s going to be culled. You really don’t want him to die.

“It’s okay,” you declare and grab his hand. “I’ll protect you.”

And you can. It only takes a bit of power to dull the sun in his blood to something more on spectrum.

“See?” You gesture for him to look, and he swipes his nose with his other hand. It takes a moment’s concentration for you to maintain the illusion with the movement, but you get it done.

He stares at you with wide eyes and tackles you into a hug and you both hit the ground again.

“Daginy!” He cries. “Thank you!”

“Gross you’re still bleeding!” you yell.


	12. The Day Everything Changed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What happens to Lystic

The market is busy and the heat rises off the concrete to smother you in sweat as you head back to Lystic with two bottles of water in your arms.

There’s some yelling ahead- someone must have broken into a fight- that you don’t pay any mind. People are always fighting at the market, accusing each other of pickpocketing and stealing and bumping into each other.

“-wearing grey, never seen anything like-”

You shuffle along through the crowd, looking for Lystic. He’s not at the stand you left him at. 

“-in the middle of the market, a mutant-” 

It’s a large throng of people, most of them much taller than you, larger than for the usual fights. 

“-blood! Bright yellow blood!” 

The realization hits you and you drop your water bottles and start pushing your way into the crowd. When you manage to push through, a wave of revulsion wracks your body, and you force yourself to keep looking. 

The ground is painted bright yellow. Lystic is dead. A subbjugulator has him by the neck, half of his head caved in, shaking his body like a rag doll at the spectators, flinging droplets at people, yelling about how heretics are worth no more than the paint in their blood. 

You stumble backwards, your hands pressed against your mouth, trembling. You were gone for fifteen minutes tops, maybe. How did this happen? 

You didn’t  _protect_  him. You made that promise over almost two sweeps ago, and you finally fucking failed him. If you hadn’t left- if you hadn’t promised him- 

You stumble back into someone in the crowd, 

“Hey!” A pair of hands shove you forward, and you collide into someone else who starts to turn. A hand grabs you by the back of your collar and hauls you backwards, 

“Lookit this grey face,” they say, tossing you back. You stumble against a stall, knocking over a few things. 

“Watch it!” snarls the shopkeeper, but he’s too busy craning his neck trying to see what’s going on to take much notice of it. 

“Hey, what are the chances this second tiny greyface is another mutie waiting to pop?” The olive turns back to their friends, a yellowblood who shrugs and pops some gum and a jadeblood who grins widely, showing pointed teeth. “El Em Ef Ay Oh,” she says. “What are the chances?” 

You’re getting harassed. You should do something, but they’re talking about Lystic. They think you’re the same as him- something  must have happened to make him bleed- if it was you, if you had been there- , even though you were never, ever in the same danger as he was, even though you both wore the same grey. They might have just let him go as another lowblood anon. 

“We’re gonna gotta test your hue, greyface,” taunts the jadeblood. “Slit open that skin of yours and see what you bleed.”

You shake your head, dazed, still shaking. “No,” you say. “I’m not-” 

The oliveblood reaches out and shoves you again, then grabs you by the front of your shirt and jerks you forward. 

“Prove it,” they say, and you push them hard, but they only stumble backwards, their hand still twisted into your shirt.

“Let me go!” You snap out a knife from your strife deck, and swipe. They let go then, jumping back. Adrenaline runs through your veins as thoughts run through your pan in circles. 

If they wanted to see your hue? They could see it. 

You draw the blade against your palm, cutting deeper than you should. You pick a deep indigo hue, and let that leak out over the brown blood that flows from the wound, holding your hand out to your harassers. 

“Happy?” you snarl, letting your eyes glow, as if you were about to voodoo them. For a fleeting second you wish you really could. The oliveblood immediately backs up, deferential. Scared, really, and immediately you feel dirty. 

“Oh shit, uh,” they say. “Sorry highblood, we didn’t know! We’ll be on our way!”

The jadeblood looks sheepish, and yells a “Sorry!” as her friend hustles them all away. You take one breath, then another. The subbjugulator was still yelling about heretics. There’s… there’s nothing you can do to help him any more.

If you tell them he was your friend, they’d cull you too, for hiding him.

There’s nothing left to do besides go home alone. 

You close your palm to hide the blood, let your psi fill up your sign with a color, any color, and run. 


	13. Get Help

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> No one's throwing dead fish at each other. Daginy needs some help with their eye.

cw: Eye trauma references

—

You stare down at the ointment Sipara gave you. It’s been four days- you need to remove the dressing on your eye and apply it on the inside of your eyelids.

The thought makes you shake.

You unwrap your head with trembling hands- half your fingers are broken– how are you going to do this?

You pull the bandage off and look in the mirror. You look awful. The dressing left pressure lines across your face and it’s a little swollen. Your right eye opens slowly, but you can’t see anything through it. Sipara put in a little plastic thing in your socket to hold the place of your eye, and you can see it’s cloudy white surface poking out from where your eye used to be.

The sensation of opening your eye and not seeing out of it was odd, to say the least. It wasn’t the same when it was covered.

You lift a hand up and trace your bottom lid, hypersensitive to your own touch. Your hands are still shaking. You can do this.

You turn the sink on and splash water on your face, take the wash cloth and gently dab it around your eye. It hurts to touch.

How are you supposed to get ointment on the inside of your eye? You need to pull your eyelids open to apply it, but you’ve only got one working pointer finger.

You can’t do it. You can’t do it alone, at least.

You peek back out of the ablution block, a hand covering your eye. Mysmus is outside, sitting in your shared room, reading a book. He looks up at you his brow immediately furrowed.

“What’s wrong, Anisen?” he asks as he puts his book aside, already halfway up.

“I need help,” you say quietly. “Sorry.”

“You don’t need to apologize,” he says as he approaches. “Is everything okay?”

You do need to apologize though it is pretty preemptive. There is no way you’re going to deal well with having someone else’s hands near your face.

“I have to put ointment in my eye,” you whisper as he draws closer.

You see the realization in his face when he puts together the possible consequences of what you’re asking.

“Ah,” he says. “Do you want help?”

“I need help,” you confirm. “I’m not going to react well.”

He nods and you let him into the block, backing up and sitting yourself on the load gaper.

He washes his hands and picks up the jar of ointment, examines it, and unscrews it. He hands it to you and kneels in front of you, his eyes gentle.

“We’ll get you accustomed first alright?” he says. “We don’t have to watch for loose bricks.”

You squint at him.

“What?” you say, and he chuckles and glances away, embarrassed.

“I mean we don’t have to get right to it,” he says and raises his hands slowly. “I’m just going to touch your cheeks okay?”

You nod, and he places his hands on your face. You can’t help but flinch, but you don’t pull away. His hands are cool on your cheeks.

“You doing okay?” he asks and you nod, fiddling with the open container of ointment. “Close your eyes?”

It causes you another swell of anxiety but you do. “I’m going to touch your eye now okay?” he says. “Not going to do anything. Just touch.”

You nod again, and he places his thumb over your eyelid, gently. Your breath hitches. The area around your eye prickles under his touch.

It’s gentle now but that can change fast. He’s got your face in both hands, he could pull you forward off the gaper, throw you to the floor, shove you into the wall, dig his fingers further into your- he takes his hands away.

“Anisen,” he says softly, as you slowly open your eyes. “You’re not breathing.”

You’re not. You take a deep breath, feeling some of the tension you’re holding resolve. You’re shaking a little. Mysmus leans forward, his hands in his lap.

“Are you okay?” he asks and you take another deep breath. You can’t bring yourself to answer, and listen to yourself breathing for longer than you should.

“Hey,” he whispers. “It’s okay. We can do this later. You can tell me if you’re scared.”

You nod. You feel a twinge of guilt over thinking he might do something. Mysmus has been nothing but good to you since you’ve met him, and he didn’t deserve that.

“You want to try again later?” He asks.

You nod. You’ve got a tremor right now and you don’t think you can speak.

“Then we can try again later,” he says, nodding.

When you do, you make it a team effort. You keep your eyes open and hold your own lids. Mysmus keeps only one hand on your face, his hands are gentle and you make it through okay.


	14. The Magpies

Daginy looks up at you from your couch, their little grey eyes wide and wary behind their glasses. They’re shy as they get, but you think they’ve eased up around you since you spent all that time making sure they weren’t about to die.

“What do we do now?” they ask quietly.

You rub the bridge of your nose, sighing as you consider your options. You didn’t think your life could get  _more_  complicated, but Herlyn really did have a way of picking up complications.

“Well we can’t send you back,” you say. “You’ll get revenge killed.”

You elbow your moirail. Herlyn shrugs sheepishly.

“Sorry,” she says. “Didn’t really think it through. But yeah, his clade ain’t gonna let this go nice and easy.”

Daginy looks down at their bandaged hands, their lusus curled up in their lap.

“I don’t have a hive anymore,” they murmur. “I don’t- I can’t-”

Actually getting a permanent place for them would be tricky. They obviously can’t afford it on stipend, and you’re not exactly in the position to be loaning wads of cash to near strangers.

“You can stay here while you recover,” you say soothingly. “For as long as you need.”

“What’s another stray?” Herlyn jokes. You elbow her again, hard. Your apartment is full of strays, yes, that you take care of, but Daginy did not need to be compared to an  _animal_.

“I mean, like no offense,” Herlyn says hastily. “Like I’m her biggest stray, y'know. Like she had to taser me the first time we met.”

Daginy blinks up at the two of you, opens their mouth as if to question it, then closes it again. “Okay,” they say. “That uh- that sounds like a story.”

You roll your eyes and give Herlyn a little shove. “Yes, and we can tell it later,” you say. “The problem we have now is that we’ve got a highblood’s clade on our tails here.”

“They haven’t caught me yet,” she says. “I mean I can take credit for the kill-”

“How many times?” you interrupt. “How many highbloods have you killed now? Social enforcement is going to come for you if you keep the pattern up.”

Herlyn grimaces, then starts ticking off fingers. “Well the cops only know about two of ‘em,” she says. “But three’s a pattern and then my life’s not worth shit.”

You’re all silent for another moment.

“I mean I  _could_  probably kill everyone who tries-” Herlyn says, tapping her chin.

“ _Herlyn!”_  you blurt out. “You can’t solve all your problems with  _murder_!”

You were trying to  _avoid_  a revenge cycle, not generate three new ones.

“Please,” Daginy says. “Don’t kill anyone else.”

They glance between the two of you, and you eye Herlyn, who catches your eye, and rubs the back of her neck.

“Well if anyone has a better idea,” she says, “I admit mine is pretty last ditch.”

“They can’t kill me if they think I’m dead,” Daginy says quietly. “If you find a body and burn it in my hive, everyone will assume he killed me in my hive.”

You exchange glances with Herlyn.

“That’s a little drastic,” you say, hesitant. “And it doesn’t solve Herlyn’s problem.”

Daginy turns to look at her, their eyes calculating. “You said they haven’t caught you yet.”

“And they haven’t,” Herlyn says with a shrug. “I’m good with it. Revenge cycle isn’t going to catch, 'cause they don’t have any idea who I am.”

You’re more hesitant. “There’s a lot of implications to faking your death,” you say. “Your stipend, for example. Skipping conscription is treason.”

Daginy hesitates, then shakes their head.

“None of that matters if I’m dead for real,” they say. “I- I’m not a fighter. If they catch up with me I’m dead.”

They look down and you sit back and sigh.

“Do you have any quadrants filled?” you ask, and they snort.

“I barely have friends,” Daginy says, steady. “Don’t worry, no one will miss me too much.”

Herlyn stands and stretches.

“Well if I’m going to plant a body then I better get moving,” she says. “Where’s the suncloak?”

You keep an eye on Daginy as Herlyn leaves. They sigh, just a little, resigned, then leans back into the couch, closing their eyes.

“How are you feeling?” you ask them, passing them another blanket. They look tired. You ought to get them a sopor patch and you get up to grab one.

“Tired,” they say. “Scared. I don’t know.”

You return with a patch, and sit on the coffee table, handing them the patch.

“For when you want to sleep,” you say. “We probably shouldn’t move you around too much right now.”

You shift, a little uncomfortably. What were you supposed to say to someone whose had their life destroyed? Who was currently in the process of ruining it further so they could stay alive?

“It’ll be okay,” you say, regretting the words as soon as they drop from your mouth. They sound empty, even to you. “I mean- rest, okay? Heal. You can stay here as long as you need.”

You’ll definitely need to move some of your animals out- you can’t afford to feed them all, Daginy, and yourself, but you have more to share than Herlyn.

“What will I do after that?” They sound lost and you sigh.

“We’ll figure it out when the time comes,” you say. “For now, you need to rest, alright?”

Daginy turns to look at you, eyes wide, brows furrowed.

“You’re really nice,” they say, almost puzzled. “You’re like the nicest person I’ve ever met.”

You smile, a little awkwardly. You’re honestly not really sure how to react to that.

“I just want to help,” you say. “I’m not the only one like this, I promise, we’re just not too common.”

They nod.

“I’m.. going to sleep now?” they say, looking at you like you’re about to say no. You only nod.

“Good light,” you say, and retreat to your room.

–

Daginy does nothing but sleep for a week. They need help eating, with their hands as burned as they are, and you help spoon soup into their mouth.

They don’t talk much, but you can tell they have a lot on their mind.

The next week, they’re chatting with you more, asking what you do, healing slowly. Herlyn invites Ferra over to teach them how to pickpocket and pick locks. Whatever they choose to do in the future, it probably isn’t going to be very legal. They pick it up quickly.

The third week, they’re starting to walk by themselves again, their healing burns still tender. They spend time to themselves, thinking, but they’ve really started warming up to you, laughing, joking, arguing intensely about subjects that don’t really matter.

At the end of the fourth week, they tell you they have an idea.

“I want to help people,” they say. “Like you, but you know, bigger.”

You raise an eyebrow, setting down the pan of brownies that Herlyn made. Herlyn peeks out from kitchen.

“What do you mean?” she calls out.

“I mean I want to help people,” Daginy says nodding. “Yes, I lost my hive and I’m fake dead, but that just means I don’t have that stuff to hold me back anymore. What you did for me, I want to do for other people.”

You shake your head.

“How are you going to do that?” you ask. “I mean, I can’t exactly take care of more people than I am already, and you, well- you don’t exactly have a hive.”

Daginy shakes their head.

“You said there are others like you,” they say. “And there are others like me. We just need to be able to make sure that they can find each other.”

There’s a grim determination in their jaw.

“I haven’t figured everything out yet,” Daginy says. “But I think we could build a network of people who want to help. And help everyone. People who don’t have a choice, who are running. People with mutations.”

They glance up at you, uncertain and vulnerable with their declaration but with a determined light that makes you think that they’ve already made up their mind.

“Mutants?” Herlyn says, walking into the living room stirring another batch of brownie mix. “You’re talking straight up hemorebellion.”

Daginy nods hesitantly. Herlyn whistles.

“And I thought I was gonna be the one that brings the popo on our asses,” she says. “How’re you gonna keep from getting your ass arrested?”

“How are they going to arrest someone that’s dead?” they joke, raising a wry eyebrow. “We keep our tracks clean and don’t take on more than we can.”

“We,” you comment. “You want our help.”

Daginy nods sort of sheepishly.

“Well, yes,” they say. “You say you want to help, don’t you?” They look straight at you, expectantly, and you find yourself thrown.

“I mean-” you stutter. “There’s a difference between helping someone right in front of you and- and-  _hemorebellion_.”

Daginy sits back, a slight frown, disappointment written all over their face.

“I’m not worth any more than anyone else in my situation,” they say. “Or worse. They need help as much as I did.”

They’re not disappointed you refused, they’re disappointed in  _you_.

“I think- I think I need some time,” you say. Daginy nods, still frowning, then gets up to get a brownie.

“Yeah,” they say. “Take your time I guess.”

You grab your moirail- Herlyn pushes the bowl of batter onto the kitchen table- and pull her to your room.

“Herlyn,” you say, as she picks you up and carries you into the pile. “Herlyn, this is crazy. Are you really thinking about doing this?”

She folds her arms around your waist and leans in, touching her forehead to yours.

“You know,” she says. “For all our talk about helping people, I think we just got showed up by this kid.”

You look up into her eyes and sigh.

“I know,” you say. “They’re a good kid.”

“Are you scared?” she asks.

You consider it for a moment, then nod. “What they’re proposing could get us all killed,” you say.

Herlyn nods, considering it. “We  _have_  known them for like a perigee,” she says. “But you know, I think its pretty safe to say we don’t have to worry about them being an empire spy or anything.”

You chuckle and shake your head. “No,” you say, “No, I don’t think so.”

“Daginy is gonna do it,” Herlyn says. “Whether or not we get involved.”

You nod. Herlyn could see it too.

“I mean that means the question is less whether or not we want to be rebels,” she says, “and more if we can live with ourselves if Daginy goes out and gets themself killed and we could have helped them avoid it.”

You lean in and sigh.

“It is,” you say. “Isn’t it.”

Herlyn pulls you into a hug.

“Honestly,” she says. “I’m in for it. I’ve always been kind of a rebel.”

You roll your eyes. “You don’t say.” Herlyn chuckles into your hair and presses a kiss to your forehead.

“And you?”

You know what your answer is already, but you take time to think about it, to try to settle that knot growing in your throat, to think about the pros and cons and choices, and really consider, really, really, consider the opportunities.

“I need to talk with them more,” you say. “I’m open to it, but we need a real plan.” 

“Don’t think they’ll object,” Herlyn says. “I mean like, Daginy’s really fucking smart. And you’re really smart. You’ll figure out something.”

“You’re smart too,” you say. “Don’t sell yourself short.”

Herlyn snorts. “I know what I’m bad at,” she says. “And this kind of smart ain’t my kind of smart.”

You nod, acquiescing.

“Then let’s go,” you say and detangle yourself from the pile. Herlyn starts to get up, and you grab her hand, giving her knuckles a kiss. She smiles down at you, and helps you to your feet.  

“Let’s go kick some ass,” she says, and you nod.

The resulting conversation lasts hours, spanning over several nights. You debate this and that, discuss your roles, and when you’re done, you feel the buzz of anticipation and nervousness.

“What do we call ourselves?” Herlyn asks.

You exchange a glance with Daginy, uncertain. They bite their lip, shrugging.

“Well,” they say, “Alnica’s technically in charge. So maybe we can just call ourselves the Magpie’s Nest.”

You glance over at your lusus, the white dappled asshole, and raise your eyebrow.

“Isn’t that a little on the nose?” you ask, a little embarrassed at the prospect of having this venture named after you. You’re still not sure how you feel about being the spymaster. It’s logically the most obvious choice, but you were also the most hesitant of the three to get started.

“Well we’ll be gathering info that you’ll be hoarding so,” Daginy shrugs. “Either way it’s fitting.”

“Alright then,” you say. “The Magpie’s Nest.”


	15. That Time Daginy Got Thrown Off A Bridge And Walked It Off

Daginy Chamae | Neuja City | 7 sweeps, 15 years old

You’re quickly overwhelmed, and outnumbered. Your face gets introduced to the concrete as your hands get pulled back behind you. You’ve definitely made to many mistakes this time around, and it’s probably gonna get you killed. 

“That’s Arneas’ midget innit?” Gilras, the small time drug lord you’ve been following bends down, to look over at you. You stare up at her as you feel a ziptie close around your wrists. “He’s tryin’ to intrude on my turf?” 

“J-just checking up on how you were doing,” you stutter. “It’s not- I can tell him there’s nothing going on- he knows where I am. It’ll be a declaration of war. I can help you even– I-” 

She squats down at you and pats your head. 

“Threw in with the wrong crew now, sweetheart,” she says. “Now I got no time for double dealing traitors, but war is what I  _want_.”

Oh you’re  _dead_ , you’re so dead. You wanted the war too, technically. With a gang war on the streets, the policeradicators would be too busy to pay attention to what you were planning, but.. you weren’t planning on it starting like this. 

“Bag ‘em and drop them in the drink,” she says, and her lieutenants pull out a duffel bag. “We don’t need Arneas on our ass before my say so.” 

It’s not the first time you’ve cursed how small you are. You break a nose with a flailing foot, but they slap some tape on your mouth and slot you in the bag without too much trouble otherwise. 

It’s suffocating in there, as you kick and struggle as you’re hauled away. You’re so fucking dead. The lieutenants around you joke and laugh, like they’re not about to murder you, and the tape muffles your outrage. 

Your stomach drops as they swing the bag back and forth and send you swinging, and you can hear the wind whistling past the bag as you go up, and then down as gravity deserts you and you can feel yourself fall and fall and fall. 

You hit the water like a brick, and scream as you think your shoulder breaks, or at least your upper arm, and a few ribs- tears run down your face as you hyperventilate as water seeps into the bag swallowing you up as you try to grab whatever air you can before you’re completely submerged. 

You’re so so so so dead. You try, in that cramped bag, to bring your hands to the front, trying to force past the pain enough to  _do something_. Instead you have to gasp, and instead of air you take in water, and when you try again, all you do is take in more, and now your air sacs are soggy and in pain– you kind of wish they picked a less painful way to kill you. 

Something grabs the bag, and suddenly you’re moving– pulled in some direction you’ve lost track of already as you fight not to take in too much water. Maybe some weird river monster is going to eat you before you can drown. That might be preferable even!

You feel something push up against the bottom of the bag and it turns out the direction is up- two distinct hands hoisting you above the water. You choke– the pain in your bones intensifying as they’re suddenly affected by gravity again, your body shaking as it chokes up water, forcing its way past the gag as it drains from the bag. 

You’re placed on solid ground, and when the bag opens up, you look up at a freckle faced seadweller with buck teeth and short hair that’s still dripping wet. Three dogs peer down at you with him, and you’re bewildered as one of them bends over and licks your face. 

You freeze, wheezing slightly, unsure what she’s going to do with you, when she grins. 

“Well howdy do,” she says. “Here I though I was rescuin’ puppies and kittens but I diddly darn fished myself out a troll! M’name’s Rickly.” 

She reaches down and takes the tape off your face from where it was flapping pushes the bag back down from around your face. 

“What’s yours?” she asks. You blink back up at her, astonished. You’re under the bridge, you’re pretty sure. There’s a little camp set up down here, and you besides the three dogs, there’s a whole herd of animals watching you from a distance. 

“D’you talk?” she asks, leaning forward again. “Y’need help? Oh dangnabit you’ve been tied up this whole time and I ain’t got a single notice in my pan.” 

She busies herself, and you can’t help but flinch when she touches you, which hurts your bones even more. You’re shaking too hard to speak, as the realization finally sinks in. 

You’re not… dead. 

—

You spend the next few nights with Rickly under the bridge, with her flock of animals. You’re hurt pretty bad, but she helps you stick your arm into a sling and feeds you along with the rest of her rescues.

You’re not even close to 100% when you leave, but you need to make a call. Your own palmhusk is busted, dead in the water. You palm a palmhusk and you dial a number you made sure to memorize before everything. 

“Arneas?” you whisper into it. “It’s Tinnic, Gilras, she’s- no! Help– help, it’s the place at thirty fourth and twent-”

You snap it shut and return the palmhusk to it’s owner, and limp along your way. 


	16. That Time There Was A Minor Glub and Daginy Freaked out

The only warning you get is a half flicker of the telegrub before it shorts out- everything is off, as much as possible, to preserve the generator out back of the little hostel.

You’d find out later that it was an imperial broadcast attempting to force its way onto the screen before the power shorted out from the surge.

As it is, you’re on your way out of the room to figure out what’s happening when sharp sound like a tack in the mind’s ear and you-

Somehow, you’re horizontal. Your head hasn’t hurt quite this bad since Lyrian. It’s swollen, pounding ache, as though your think pan is doing it’s level best to throw itself through your skull but- you take a hiccuping breath when you realize someone has their hand pressed against your eyes.

Fear bubbles into your throat like bloody froth as your thoughts turn into a panicked scramble. It must have been a trap, you must have been caught, is it Lyrian? Is she back? Your other eye. Your one remaining eye. Is it still there? Was it removed? Are you totally blind now? Where’s Mysmus? Where’s Herlyn?

A strangled sob catches in your throat as you realize they must be dead, or worse- and if they’re still keeping you alive- The suicide pill- you don’t have it on you, you could have had it in your mouth already but Herlyn wouldn’t let you keep it on you unless you were doing field work which you haven’t been- but if they won’t kill you, if they won’t kill and take you again instead-

You can’t do this again. You can’t.

You don’t care if she hurts you for it- she’d make a mistake eventually and just snap your neck some day. You tear at the hand on your face and try to shove yourself upright, even as she pulls you back down.

“Woah! Dags, Dags you’re fine.” It’s Herlyn’s voice. What? “Shhh hey hey you’re safe it’s okay.”

She continues to whisper comforting words even as she holds you down and you can’t bring yourself to believe any of them. Was this a trap? Some kind of voice stealing psi? You lie there for a moment shaking hard, clutching at the hand on your face as you try to work up the wherewithal to speak.

“L-let,” you manage, your voice as shaky as you are. “L-let go.” She wouldn’t do it. She wouldn’t do it and then you’d know.

“Okay,” she says. “Just slowly okay? Don’t hurt yourself.”

You bolt upright anyway and scramble away. Your head pounds for the effort. You open your remaining eye but your vision is clouded with brown. You recognize the pattern of the motel carpet. A blurry shape of black and red- Herlyn really is right next to you.

“It was a glub,” she says. She’s got yellow streaks on her face, streaming from her nose. “Knocked all of us out. ‘parently there was a broadcast where the empress said as much. Everyone’s talking about it online. Everyone whose up I mean.” 

Your hands fly to your face as you shut your eyes again. It’s sticky with blood. You’re still bleeding, actually. From your socket too. Your breath catches in your throat as you shake. Helplessness swamps you, the same helplessness that swallowed you when Lyrian had pulled your eye out of your head, between the moments she had finished the procedure and started suturing the wound.

You want to shake off the memory and try to orient yourself but moving your head like that seems like a bad idea. You’re not caught. You’re not caught.  

“M-mysmus?” you whisper. Suddenly you’re terrified he’s gone. You don’t hear him. You were so preoccupied with yourself you didn’t even think about what happened to him.

“He’s still out,” Herlyn says with a sigh. “He’s still alive and he’s not bleeding.”

It’s a relief. He’s okay. Mostly. He’d wake up soon, you hope.

You stagger to your feet but you but you barely get halfway up before the world tilts to the side and Herlyn has to catch you. The jolt brings a new spring of fresh blood flowing from your face and being touched somehow feels like a brand. A cry tears from your throat as you wrestle yourself backwards head pounding all the while, but it’s still just Herlyn.

“Hey hey it’s all good I’m just putting you back down,” she says as she lowers you gently to the ground. You squeeze your eyes shut again as you cling to her sleeves until she lets go.

You hate feeling like this. You hate feeling so useless. You can’t even stand without falling, and it’s like you’ve been shoved back half a sweep back to the moments after your rescue, except with no sense that it was over.

There’s every chance there might be another glub. There’s no guarantee you’ll wake up for the next one.

“Man, Dags,” Herlyn says. “You’re still bleeding, hold on.”

You flinch as you hear a scuffle but she doesn’t touch you, just walks off. You hear the sink turn on. A moment later and Herlyn presses a wet towel into your hand. You hold the cool cloth up against your face and start to stem the flow.

“I’m just going to like, move the pile over to you okay?” You hear her voice move around the room. “I’m the best off out of you guys so just.. just let me handle things okay? You should stay put till Mysmus wakes up and we can figure out what’s wrong exactly. Don’t want you to bleed more than you’ve got already.

You nod, despite the fact the movement just causes you pain.

You stay as still as possible, exhausted, as Herlyn gathers up the pile of cushions and puts them at your feet.

“Just chill out here for a bit?” she says. “You need anything else?”

You shake your head as you push yourself towards the pile of cushions- your fingers don’t hurt like you feel like they should- and sink into the fabric.

“I’m gonna see if anyone else needs help okay?” Herlyn says, heading for the door. “Get some rest

Rest. Rest sounded good. If you’re asleep you don’t have to deal with this.

Lyn’s gotten really dependable, you think. You owe her a lot.

You settle into the cushions, pressing the cool cloth against your face. You think about the cyanide pill. If you had it on you today, like you had wanted….

You try not to think about it.


	17. That Time Daginy Got Tortured

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for Torture. Nothing too terribly graphic tho.

_—-_

_Daginy Chamae | 8 sweeps, 18 years | Granite Guts Harbor | 3118 words_

tw: torture, suicide attempt and ideation

—

You’ve heard of Lyrian Aubade. It was in the files you went through by chance on the breakdown and work up of Granite Guts. Signmate to the man in charge, an interrogarroter. You had an agent in her office who had added blueprints and an overview of her power and personality to the mass of information the Magpies had gathered, if you could only remember everything you had read.

It’s hard to focus on that though, when she’s right in front of you, in a locked room, humming to herself as she makes careful stitches on an embroidery hoop. She barely pays any attention to you, but all your scrutiny is on her. Her face is calm, placid, half lidded and her paint barely creased. If it wasn’t for the clown paint and the fact she’s got you locked in a room with her, you probably would have passed her over as being a threat.

She doesn’t even have you tied up, that’s how confident she is about keeping you here. The room itself is pretty bare. The light is a bare bulb. The walls are painted a dull grey, but you can make out the faded outline of wire shelving against them. Probably a reworked storage room, and not the set up she had at her own office. You wonder why she’s not taking you there.

You haven’t been processed in the full extent of the law- why? You don’t expect you’ll get any answers, but you don’t get what Aubade’s even doing with her little art project.

What did the file say about her powers again? You know she has them and they’re definitely mind altering, that lets her see into what you’re feeling. It’s a power she shares with her signmate, which is how he found you when you attempted an escape. You picked the lock on the handcuffs and turned invisible when he left you in his office to get his signmate, but when he found you “gone” from the locked room, he had simply walked over to you and grabbed you.

You’d lost your psi for your fouled attempt- they plugged in a nullifier bug into the back of your neck so you’re basically done for. You didn’t tell anyone you’d be here so there’s no hope of rescue. As dumb of a move that had been, you’re somewhat grateful. To get you out of this situation wouldn’t be a good use of your limited resources. If Alnica staged an attempt and they failed? No, it’s better this way.

You just have to clamp down on everything. No feeling, no words. You’re not going to speak at all. All you have to do is hold out under torture. It’s been so long you’ve just been sitting here though, the hard edge of fear softens to a sort of anxiety. Maybe she won’t go through with it. Maybe you’ll just sit here forever.

Aubade sighs and you stiffen. You didn’t realize how relaxed your posture had gotten, even as your arms are folded tightly. She flips around her embroidery hoop to show you the result- two rows of embroidered letters.

“The measure of love is love without measure,” she reads, her voice soft and sentimental. “It’s a beautiful sentiment, isn’t it?”

You don’t say anything in return, just glare right back. What is she getting at? All she does is smile at you.

“You’re not in trouble dear,” she says. “It’s obvious you’ve been through some hard times. I imagine there were some extreme circumstances that lead you to the waterways below the harbor.

You don’t believe her. You know who she is, what she does, what she wants. But some part of you thinks that maybe you can use this to get out.

“You’re protecting something,” she continues, after an awkwardly long silence. “That much is clear to me. It’s also evident that you’re resourceful, talented, and very resilient. You are also much too young for this. Something must have forced you to this life.”

She’s on the wrong track. She doesn’t know anything about you. No name, no ID, no nothing. She’s just making conjectures and guesses, and that gives you somewhat of an edge, even as she tries to flatter you out of your shell.

“This meeting isn’t on the books,” she says, like you haven’t already figured that one out. “There is no crime charged here. What I see here isn’t a budding criminal but a talented but troubled young troll who, with a little help, could rise to the top very quickly.”

She’s going to give you an offer. Something you can use- but no. No, you can’t. Yeah, you might be resourceful and resilient- you wouldn’t have made it this far otherwise- but Aubade’s an adult whose torn through the heads of hundreds if not thousands of people. You can’t take any of the bait she’s laying out for you or you’d find yourself dangling at the end of her rope before you realized how you got there. She’s just fucking with you, this whole thing.

“No,” you say before you realize what you’re doing. “You’re full of shit.”

Aubade just smiles at you, razor thin, the sort of smile you see on faces that are about to hurt you. Your pumper beats itself dizzy with fear as she clucks her tongue at you.

“None of that language now,” she says, and before you can shove the chair back to avoid it, she’s already struck you across the face.

——

You’re not really a fighter- you’ve combat manuals and watched people brawl, but you didn’t commit to the practice you needed to actually be effective because there was always a million and one other things to do.

But you know to keep your thumb outside of your fist and when Aubade throws you to the ground and tries to pin you down, you manage to punch her in the cheek, grease paint coming off on your knuckles.

Aubade freezes as you wriggle in her grasp and you catch the look in her eye- enough venom to drown you in, and you lose your breath to the fear.

She snaps your finger backward for that, leaving you cringing on the ground as she beats you until you have to at least try to curl up to defend your head. It’s not even because you refused to answer a question- she’s hitting you just to hit you, because you hit her back.

There’s a brief reprieve from the blows and you chance a look up as Aubade tosses her curly mass of hair back behind her shoulders, the barest glisten of sweat through her make up. She grabs your wrist and wrenches you out of your cringe.

“Don’t you disrespect me,” she murmurs, low.

You’re seized by the sudden urge to spit in her face, but before you can go through with it, her eyes narrow and she hits you again and all you can do is take the blows from under her grip.

———

It doesn’t always hurt when she touches you. Sometimes, when you’ve been sobbing for too long, she’ll just hold you instead. The first time she tried, you fought her, but that earned you a hand wrapped around your throat and your vision blurring until you passed out. You woke up in her arms, her fingers threading through your hair, a soft tune humming in your ears.

She could crush you like this. The fear holds you still, shaking, as Aubade just pets your hair and shushes your whimpers until slowly, very slowly the fear eases and you could have fallen asleep in her arms.

You’re just so tired- you hadn’t slept much the week before this even, and you don’t know how you’re this relaxed when you’re in pain and should be afraid but you find yourself drifting off.

———-

Torture involves a lot more scolding than you thought it would. It’s like she thinks she’s your lusus, with how she tells you you have to eat to keep your strength up, spoons food to your mouth, compliments you on being strong, tears into you for being disrespectful and ungrateful.

You’re glad you left your actual lusus with Alnica. You don’t want to know what Aubade would do with her.

You can’t bring yourself to fight with her anymore. You wish you could stay angry, but she’s beating it out of you. 

You’ve done too much of it yourself- you remember being furious a lot more often when you were younger, but when the stakes went up, keeping your cool became too important to let your temper get the better of you.

You try to hold onto it whenever a flicker of it comes by but she notices, always notices and she’ll scold you for it and strangle it out of you, until you’re so afraid she might notice you’re angry you can’t summon up any real heat at all.

But when she’s not hurting you, when she’s combing her fingers through your hair and humming, you can’t help but try to hold onto those moments for as long as possible.

Even though you know it’ll end with one thing- a quiet question, one you can’t answer, and it’ll all start over again.

——-

Do you deserve this?

Lyrian tolerates your quiet sobs as she stitches up your arm. It’s a measure that’ll let you live a little longer. 

You managed to find a screw in the corner of the room, dug the point deep into your arm and pulled, leaving a long brown line behind that bled and bled and bled. Lyrian had clamped a hand on the wound and pressed until you couldn’t feel your hand anymore, scolding you gently for the attempt on your life.

There was very little reason to stick around longer. There’s no hope of escape or rescue, and all Lyrian wants from you is something you can’t give.

You’ve hurt so many people, directly and indirectly. You’ve let people die. You’ve torn apart livelihoods and quadrants. Maybe this pain is the penance for all of that.

Did you do enough good to balance out the bad? Maybe you gave a few more sweeps to the mutants you’ve helped out, or the other rebels who relied on you before the empire catches up with them again.

You’ve never asked yourself before- you don’t know what you’d do if the answer is no- but now that you’re looking the end in the face- was it worth it? Was all the sacrifice, the stress, the pain- was it all worth it?

You don’t have an answer.

—–

Lyrian hums as she tapes your finger up, and it’s hard not to feel grateful that she’s even bothering. It’s the sixth one she’s broken, almost your whole hand- if she didn’t tape them up it’d be unbearable to move them at all.

She puts as much effort into fixing you as she does breaking you down. Some puppet that she rips and remakes until she’s satisfied with you. How long can you last? How much of you is what she’s made you?

How much does that matter when you’re going to die anyway? You try to hold as still as you can as she works, but you can’t help the shiver and whine that runs through you as she finishes up and rolls you onto your back raw with the stripes she just laid into you. You tremble with the effort to swallow the pain instead of reacting.

“Hush dear,” she says. “You know it could be worse.”

You know, but that doesn’t stop your vision from going slightly hazy with the pain pressing like a brand into your back.

“You wouldn’t have to put up with this if you only listened,” she murmurs. She puts a hand on your chest, right on your breastbone. You feel your chest expanding and contracting under hand as she leans in, tilting her chin closer to you. You grab onto her shoulder with a broken hand, a silent plea for her to ease off.

She cocks her head at you, her eyes cold and leans in, and for one crazy moment you think she might kiss you. You know you’re nothing to her but a punching bag with some information in it. Did you want her to kiss you? If she did, you’d let her. Some part of you is disgusted at the idea, but you’d be important to her, in at least that moment.

She’d hurt you less, you think, scrambling for someway to justify the thought. She’d hurt you less.

Instead of doing any of that, she asks you a question that you can’t answer and she shoves you further into the ground until you’re begging for her to stop please, you’d do anything.

It’s the first words you’ve said in… you’re not sure how long. Hours? Nights? Weeks? Perigees?

Lyrian smiles at you and your pumper leaps in your chest.

——

You tell her your name. Your voice is sore and it croaks but now she has something to call you besides wriggler.

You’ll die anyway, and you have nothing important associated to your legal name. Being called by your real name in the sea of aliases is a luxury Lyrian can give you.

Relief swamps you and floods to your eyes as she smiles her approval.

She asks you why and the words spill, stuttering from your lips as you explain why you broke into Granite Guts, sobbing as you do- you have no illusions about what she might do, but if no one else knows what happened to them at least she will, after you’re gone.

She’s the only thing you have left. If it wasn’t for her you wouldn’t hurt like this. If it wasn’t for her you’d be dead. That counted for something.

She’s the only comfort you have. You can’t hate her for that. You desperately wish you did.

Lyrian asks you another question, about who’s been helping you and you want to tell her so badly.

But the question draws you out of the little bubble Lyrian has you trapped in. It reminds you of the outside world where you set up networks and connections and had people relying on you to keep your mouth shut.

You can’t tell her anything. You’ve already told her too much. Slowly, achingly, you clench your teeth together and seal away any desire you have to speak.

You feel her grip on you tighten, the hand in your hair seizing a handful as she pulls your head back. You know to expect pain.

But you don’t expect her to take your eye.

She cuts it out of your head and stitches the blood back in, and as fuzzy as you’re getting as she patches you up and hums, you hear someone scream your name.

———

You wake up somewhere different- cool air on your face grass on your skin and your first thought is that you’ve finally died.

Your second thought is that you didn’t think the afterlife was still so painful. It’d be just your luck to be tortured into ghost hood so that you’d be in pain forever.

“Daginy?”

That’s your name, your actual name and when you open your eyes- eye you see the night sky with a ship streaking up into the atmosphere.

You see Herlyn’s face and Ferra’s, and helmsman you don’t know. You stare at them. Were they dead too? You hate the thought- it’s been so long since you were in regular contact- did you just never know?

“Oh Daginy.” Ferra’s voice is a heart broken whisper as she reaches out to touch your face.

You flinch and your head throbs like someone’s pressed her finger in your empty socket.

You catch an exchanged glance between Herlyn and Ferra.

“We’re not going to hurt you,” Herlyn tries, her voice soft. “You’re safe. We got you out of there, right?”

They… got you out?

You’re not dead? They came for you?

You struggle to sit up, as much as everything hurts, as much as your head throbs and try to get a grasp on what’s happening. Your head feels so fuzzy and you can’t quite catch up on what’s going on.

You got out? They got you out?

You don’t know what to do. You don’t know what to feel. Every heave of your chest strains your wounds and every breath feels broader and shallower.

When you finally open your mouth what comes out is a wail.

**——-**

Your mind is a mess as you try to sort out what you’re feeling and what you’re not. You try and remember who you were before you were taken- Herlyn says you were there for a week, which doesn’t sound right. It felt like maybe a perigee and she had taken you apart so thoroughly.

Lyrian’s power wasn’t just to sense what you were feeling, you’ve realized, but also to change it. Whenever she held you and hummed, she must have been changing something to make you feel warm and loved and-

You break off that chain of thought before you can start missing her.

You wish you figured that one out earlier. Maybe then you could have figured out if what you were feeling was yours or hers.

All you know for sure is that the anger is yours. She never liked it, squeezed as much as she could out of you.

The fear- well. She didn’t have to try very hard with that one. Anyone with a working pan would be afraid of her after what she did to you.

The rest of it is a jumble.

You hate yourself you’re angry you’re guilty you’re afraid and you miss her despite the pain. How much was Lyrian and how much was it you? You hate how your feelings and your thoughts were so distant from each other. You could feel one thing but know that you were made to feel that way and if you hadn’t been manipulated you’d feel something else that you don’t actually feel at all.

It was a mess. Lyrian did this to you, and you should hate her, you really really should. But you don’t and you can’t and so you hate yourself instead.

If there was a chasm between your pan and your pumper there was really only one thought that bridged the gap:

That you were better off dead.


	18. That Time Daginy Got Hit On Palewise by a Seadweller When They Were Trying to Learn How to Swim

The weather’s a misty drizzle, the miserable sort that’s chased most people out from the streets. You’ve got a towel pulled over your head, the best hood you’ve got, but it doesn’t stop the rain from routinely misting up your glasses and soaking through your jacket. A drizzle was manageable but you just don’t like rain. Water seeps through its seams and soaks you head to toe, leaving you cold and shivering without a reliable place to get dry, not unless you wanted to go back to Ptolem.

He’d welcome you back, you’ve got no doubt, but you also don’t want to crawl back to him every time you hit a minor bump. You’re not gonna work corners for him forever, and he hasn’t come looking for you, so he probably agrees. You’ve got your own stuff to do.

Fog has settled across the river in a thick blanket so that you can barely see the water’s surface, much less the otherside. You can already hear the chorus of barking as you approach the bridge, from Rickly’s pack of animals. Hopefully they remember you, instead of, you know, tearing you apart as soon as you hit their territory.

“Rickly?” you call out, as you hop down from the pedestrian path onto the soggy ground. Mud squelches under your feet, soft with the rain, the patches of grass not enough to hold the ground firm.

You see a furry mass of dog lusii charging towards you first, barking and wagging their tails.   
  
“Oh wait-” you manage before the biggest dog in front, Bull, jumps on you and knocks you clean into the mud, jarring your barely healed ribs. “Ow!”

He’s licks your face excitedly, but you can push him and the other dogs away without too much trouble. They do remember you, and you begrudgingly give out a few pets as you nurse your ribs.

“Rickly?” you call out again, looking around. The underside of the bridge is about how you remember it. There’s the little shelter built from wooden slats and plastered over with mud and newspaper, with the pile of cushions in the corner, the half filled bowls of lusus food that litter the underside of the bridge. You would have never believed a seadweller lived here, if you hadn’t met her.

“Well howdy!” You hear her voice echo out from somewhere. It takes you a moment to find her, but Rickly’s face rises out of the water, a fin flicking off droplets as she rises halfway out of the water. “You’re back! How’re them ribs doin’?”

You pick yourself off the ground, scraping as much mud off your pants as possible as you slide down the hill to the shore. You move pointedly, careful and wary. Every landdweller knows that being near a body of water mean you had to watch out for seadwellers, but Rickly wasn’t about to drown you or anything.

“Better than they’d be without you,” you say, as she approaches. “I just wanted to drop by and say thanks again.” Before you can think better of it, you say, “I brought you something.”

“Oh!” Rickly’s close enough now that you can count freckles, her eyebrows up in interested curiosity, and you kind of regret coming. “What’d you get me?”

What do you get for someone who could have everything, but apparently wanted none of it?

You pull out a handful of dog food coupons. You realize belatedly, that your hands were still muddy, so now you’ve got dirt in your pockets and on the gift coupons, but all you can do now is shake them off the best you can and try not to wrinkle them too much.

“Um,” you say. “It’s not much but-”

Rickly takes them, holds them up and grins.

“Hot diggity dang!” she exclaims. “You even remembered the sort of dog food I get!”

“I’ve got a pretty good memory,” you say, lamely.

“You’re darn tootin’!” she says. “Imma put this in the tin can with seashells and the shiny rocks.”

She steps forward, you step back to the side to get out of her way, but the ground is a lot further down than you expect it to be. It’s a hole, but you’ve already overbalanced, tripped, and plowed face first into the river.

The cold wraps around your face and throat and you can’t see. You can’t breathe. You’ll drown, but you’re not tied up this time.

You shove yourself up, spit out your mouthful of water and run out of the river as fast as you can.

“Woah woah there pardner,” Rickly says, looking over you, concerned and… blurry. You dropped your glasses in the water. “Your fiddle ain’t lookin’ very fit.”

“Ha,” you manage. You’ve heard her speak without the ridiculous put-on of a dialect, and you know she’s just trying to make light of your embarrassing fall, but it’s hard to feel like she’s not laughing at you. Great, now you’re covered in mud and completely soaked, instead of just a little muddy and wet, and you’re more than a little mortified.  

She reaches out a hand and you take it, toddering to your feet. You’ve got to find you glasses before it washes away in the water, but you can’t seem to get even a little bit close to the river. You just clutch your wet coat closer to you instead.

“Oh, here!” Rickly, at least, catches on and rifles in the water for a bit before pulling your glasses out.

She steps in close and plops them on your nose before you can blink.

“Um, thanks?” you say.

“There ye go,” she says with a grin. “Pretty as a picture.”

“Of- of a drowned rat maybe,” you say, from behind the waterlogged frames. You raise trembling hands to shake off the water and adjust them so you can see properly. Rickly looks down at you, bemused and shaking her head.

“You know,” she says. “If you’re scared of the water, I could teach you to swim.”

“I- I’m not scared,” you stammer, feeling the blood rise to your cheeks. “I’m just- just cold.”

You’re not sure how this day could possibly get worse, but you think maybe you should leave before the universe figures it out.

“I-I-“ you stammer. “You know? I sh-should get going. My lusus wants me hive.”

Your face colors. You’ve stayed with her for days at a time. She knows your lusus isn’t waiting for anyone. Handmaid. You turn and scramble up the hill before you can embarrass yourself any further.

“O-okay!” Rickly calls up from behind you. “But if ye change your mind, the offer’s open!”

“Sure!” you call back, and it’s not till you find a bus stop to take shelter in, far away from the river that you remember you left your towel at the river bank.  

—

Water isn’t everywhere on land, but when it crops up you start to notice. Like a fountain in town square, or a particularly large puddle sitting in at the side of the road. It keeps raining too, so you’re basically always wet.

You notice that you do get… weird around water.

You get nervous, sitting at the edge of the fountain, like you’re sure someone’s going to shove you in and hold you under, even though it’s probably the worst way to kill you in public. Crossing a bridge makes you shake, and looking out on the river makes your digestive sack turn over.

It’s actually annoying to the point that you need to fix it, before it gets out of hand and you can’t cross a bridge anymore or something stupid like that.

It’s not even a week later when you find yourself standing at the river bank again. The weather’s cloudy, but not rainy. The ground’s firmer, so you at least don’t have to worry about slipping and falling as you’re beset by barking dogs again.

Rickly’s brushing a mat out of Lucky’s fur, when she looks up to see what the dogs are barking at. Her face brightens, a grin on her face.

“You’re back!” She exclaims. “Didja change your mind?”

You straighten from petting Bull, with a sheepish smile on your face.

“Hey,” you say, still lamely, even if you aren’t covered with mud any more. “Yeah, I- well I thought it’d be useful to know.”

“Well I gotta say I’m pleased as a raccoon with three cherry pies,” she says, jumping to her feet. “Let’s get started!”

You’re not really sure how you feel about being compared to stolen baked goods, but at least she doesn’t seem to think you’re a total loser after the way you left last time.

“Here, I’ll lend you some of my clothes,” Rickly says. “You landdwellers don’t usually have any clothin’ decent for the water.”

She pulls a set of clothes from her sylladex and shoves them into your hands. It’s just shorts and a t-shirt, but just by touching it you can feel the rolling silky quality that marked it as seadweller clothing.

“Go get changed!” She flaps her hands at you and gestures for you to take shelter in her little lean to.

You don’t generally do shorts, but Rickly’s tall and wide enough that wearing anything long would be impossible. You don’t want her to question you on your scars so you just use psi to turn the large ones on your knees to a plain, flat grey. You feel kind of weird, wearing her clothes that are super baggy on you, with her color and sign, but what else are you supposed to do when you’re going to try and swim?

You walk barefoot on the shore, still nervously scooting around the water, with the waist of her pants hanging loosely around your hips and dragging down past your knees. You’re pretty sure you look like a fool but at least you won’t be getting your clothing wet.

Rickly’s waiting for you in the river, already in far enough that the water comes up to your knees.

“Don’t you look mighty fine!” she exclaims, waving with a grin. “Looking good in those clothes!”

You roll your eyes.

“Ha ha,” you say sarcastically. “I’m just here too swim.”

“Well then hop on in!” She exclaims, coming up and holding out both her hands for you to take. Rickly’s not going to hurt you remind yourself, as you take a deep breath and put your hands on hers. She fished you out of the river once, you don’t see why she’d put you back in, unless she really was that insulted by the dog food coupons, which really, really was not as good of an idea as you thought it was.

”Mosey on down with me, pardner,” she says and pulls you slowly into the water with her. “I ain’t gonna let no harm come to you I promise.”

You clutch her hands as the skin at the back of your neck absolutely crawls as you shuffle slowly into the water. It’s gross. It’s cold, but she brings you in until the water’s about your chest and you absolutely do not let go.

“Now water’s got more weight to it than air,” you say. “You push it beneath you and it’ll hold you up, high as any butterfly in the sky, see?”

She tries to pull her hand free from your grip to demonstrate, but you cling to it, and while she could probably break all your fingers in a snap, she just laughs awkwardly.

“You can let go now, darlin’,” she says. “No? Okay then we go a little bit slower. Let’s head back to shore.”

“I’m not scared,” you say out loud, even though the words ring hollow in your ears.

It takes a while for you to get used to the water, and it takes a couple nights- you’re not staying with her this time, you’ve got stuff to do- but when you’ve got a free moment you come back.

Rickly shows you how to move in the water, how to shape your hands like mock fins, different movements that can bring you forward or backwards in the water as you watch and think about doing it on your own.

You’re determined not to let this paranoia get the better of you too. You refuse. You sit in the shallows, in the water but it’s easy enough to roll back out. You practice some of the movements on land and in shallow water, Rickly pulling you along so you can know how it feels, but you never let the water wash over your head.

Rickly stays pretty patient though, joking around in her over the top way, literally holding your hand as you walk into the water, even though sometimes she does have to puzzle out how landdwellers breathe when they’re in the water.

That’s another thing you have to get used to. Rickly’s a touchy teacher. She takes your hands and moves them into position, pulls on your arms to show how to move them properly. For all your justifications about how she wouldn’t hurt you on purpose, you know she could shatter your arm without a second thought. It’s not comfortable, it’s efficient and if it gets you to swim, then you’ll live.

“I’m gonna do it,” you say, up to your chest in water. “I’m gonna dunk my head.”

“You got this,” Rickly says, holding your hands. “I got you.”

You gather up a breath and as much courage as you can and plunge. Again, you remember the wrap around, suffocating, pressure against your face, the tightness of fear and the sharp pain of broken bones, but you stay down, underwater.

The water can’t hurt you if you don’t open your mouth and breathe it in. This was fine. All you had to do was stay down and not open your mouth.

Don’t breathe.

Your lungs long for air, but all you have to do is stay down not breathe. Don’t breathe.

Then, like an idiot, you open your mouth because your lungs burn for air, and-

Oh fuck you can’t breathe.

You shoot up out of the water, spitting and gasping- but there’s no water in your pipes, you’re not choking on anything, but the air you suck in just doesn’t seem like it’s enough.

A pair of hands grab you by the shoulders and starts pulling you off somewhere. Where? A ragged gasp escapes your throat as you struggle for proper air so you can get away from the cold tangle of limbs currently pulling you away- out of the water, you realize from the wind on your wet skin, onto the sand and dirt, dry as dry can be.

“I got you,” Rickly says. She’s got you cradled in her arms. “It’s okay, it’s okay. Shhh.”

You gulp in the air and rub furiously at your eyes to stare up at her when she raises a hand to firmly pap you on the cheek.

You freeze, staring at her in alarm. Oh. Oh no.

Rickly’s face turns from concerned, to alarmed, then to a bright, violet embarrassment. She drops you and you scramble to your feet.

“I’m so sorry-“ you start.

“Oh Empress-“ she says. You both stop and moment, blinking at the other, then start again.

“I did not mean-“

“I thought we were-“

You stop again, and this time Rickly takes a deep breath, looks up at the underside of the bridge and gestures for you to continue. You take several deep breaths, trying to calm the panic rising in your chest. What just happened? How do you turn down a seadweller whose been nothing but patient with you, but you don’t feel an inkling of pity for? “I just- I just wanted to learn to swim.”

“I’m so, so sorry, Rickly,” you say. “I didn’t think- I mean, I didn’t mean to lead you on or anything.”

“I- I thought we’ve been flirting for the whole week,” Rickly’s voice sounds thick with emotion and more than ever before, you want to the bridge to collapse on you both. “But you really just haven’t noticed?”

“Um,” you say, as you think over all the joking compliments, the lending of her clothes, all the touching during swimming lessons and realize, belatedly, that that might have been flirting. “No?”

“I mean,” Rickly says, taking a step forward as you take a step back. “I really like you and I want to give it a shot. Was there a chance your reaction was just surprise?” She laughs, a half broken sound and gestures towards the river where you’ve been having your swimming lessons. “Don’t you trust me, Anarin?”

You feel a nervous smile crawl across your face, the answer to her question hurtles from her own lips as she calls you by your fake name. This is absurd. This is absurd! How were you supposed to respond to that?? Bridge collapse, earthquake, you’d even take a flash flood right about now too, but the only way you can count on is your own two feet.

“Um,” you say. “I have to go.”

You grab your glasses and jacket and make a run for it.

“Anarin!” Rickly cries out behind you. “Wait!”

You hurtle up the hill, not daring to look behind you, dashing onto the pavement and into the city.

You’re still wearing her clothes- her symbol and her color are going to be evident to anyone watching so as soon as you turn a corner you turn invisible and watch as Rickly runs right past you, violet tears in her eyes.

Oops.

You clutch your jacket to your chest, trying to calm your pumper down from the flitter flutter in your rib cage. You liked Rickly well enough, but like. In a platonic way. You never meant to break anyone’s pumper. And you never did get to swim.

You don’t think you can ever face her again.

——

Your reflection’s a pale shadow in the water, under the bright bathroom lights. You stare down at the sink basin, filled up as high as it would go.

Your mistake last time was staying under too long, you think. You’ll just try it little by little so you’re used to it.

You know the basics of swimming now at least. You can’t exactly find a safe place to practice now, even if you do have a set of seadweller clothes now, but you can practice holding your breath underwater. Someday, you wouldn’t panic at the thought.

You dunk your head into the sink.


	19. Daginy's got a Flushhh Crusssssh

You wake in a cold sweat, with daylight still scoring a bright line through the flap of the tent. You’re scared, you’re resigned, you- you had a daymare. Fear still rests heavy, like a band around your chest so you do your best to take a deep breath. Your bedroll feels like a trap so you shuffle yourself upright and shed it, pulling your knees close.

What did you dream? You can’t remember the details anymore, but you think you were being held down again, some suffocating fear that-

The bedroll next to yours rustles.

“Mmmhuh? What’s wrong,” Dzhiya mumbles sleepily. “Do we gotta go?”

You didn’t mean to wake her up. Her tent had ripped on a branch and you couldn’t let her sleep in the sun so you had shuffled over in the space you had and let her sleep in yours. It’s not easy to relax with someone right next to you, when her every movement startles you, but just because you can’t sleep doesn’t mean she shouldn’t. At least one of you should be awake for the whole night.

“No,” you whisper. “Just a daymare. Go back to sleep.”

In the sliver of light you’ve got, you can see the strip of color underlining the curve of her face as she turns towards you. She’s barely awake, her eyelids fluttering to blink away the sleep, her arm tucked under her head like a pillow.

“Y’wanna talk about it?” she says, and you can’t help but chuckle. You’ve never shared with her exactly what you’ve dreamed about- the stuff you can remember gets bad, the stuff you can’t doesn’t matter, but it’s still nice to be asked. You’d rather stay sectioned in this part of your life where the thing that does is what the two of you are doing the next night. It can’t last forever, you know. But you can just enjoy it until it stops.

“I don’t even remember it anymore,” you whisper. “Don’t worry about me. I just need a little time.”

Dzhiya doesn’t go back to sleep though. You watch as she pushes herself up to her elbows, her hair swinging lightly in the light.

“Mm,” she hums and leans over, placing her cheek against your shoulder. Her touch is warm and you watch bewildered as she pushes her face up closer to yours and brushes her nose up against your cheek, nuzzling you. You stare at her, but she doesn’t seem to notice. Her eyes are still half closed.

“You’re doing fine,” she mumbles, then retreats back to her bedroll, turns around, and promptly starts snoring.

You, on the other hand, are now very awake. Your pumper feels like it’s trying to run a marathon out of your chest, and you press a hand to your cheek and it’s warm. You’re blushing. You bury your face in your hands.

Oh, Handmaid’s mercy. You think you might have a little bit of a crush on Dzhiya. You shrink into your bedroll, still blushing hard and tuck your head into the cover, but it still takes you ages to get to sleep. Dzhiya suddenly feels very warm by your side.

The next day, she doesn’t seem to remember what happened and you don’t dare ask. You just stitch her tent back up so you can actually get some sleep. 


	20. Friendly teasing

“Anisen?” you hear Mysmus call out, as you step out of the ablutionblock. He’s standing over at the nightstand, leaning over it with your notebook flipped open.

You feel your face heat up as you remember what you put on that page. You absolutely didn’t intend for him to see it, but he points down at it and half turns, grinning.

“You took notes on the way I speak?” he says, picking it up and holding it out for you.

You can’t quite look him in the eye as you step forward to take it, scratching at your hairline.

“Yeah,” you say a little embarrassed, looking at your notes. You don’t have many lines on the sheet, but you’ve written down every saying you haven’t understood.

“Well kill me a crow,” he says, taking two steps backwards into a chair and sitting down. “I didn’t think you’d be so interested.”

You wrinkle your nose at him, already reaching for a pen. “I don’t like not knowing things,” you say. Kill me a crow. You’re pretty sure you know what it means. It’s not a hard leap to make.

Mysmus laughs softly as you maneuver towards the pile, jotting it down as you carefully sit yourself down in it.

“You’re really writing it down,” he says, looking at you over his glasses.

You open your mouth to say something, then close it, when you’ve realized you walked into that one. If you weren’t blushing before you are now.

“You knew I’d do it too,” you accuse him.

“The blood’s on my hands,” he says with a shrug, lifting them, startlingly unbloodied and fluttering them. You roll your eye.

“You made a mistake on your notes, by the way,” Mysmus says casually and you frown and look down at your list. You take good notes. You make a point of it. You don’t see anything out of place, but when you open your mouth and look up to ask, he’s grinning at you again.

“Just kidding,” he says, looking smug, and you shake your head and smile.

“You’re taking advantage of my vulnerable state,” you retort. “You’re a devilish man, Mysmus Errget.”

“You got to lock me up,” he says, hands up in a position of surrender even as he leans back carefully in the chair. “Lock me up and throw away the key. After all, when you throw the devil a bone in the courtyard, you need to make sure it’s fresh.”

You stare at him. Mysmus just grins back.

“You’ll the follow clock and not the cat’s tail,” he says. “So don’t leave without a proper offering of mackerel and halibut if you’re trying to tell the time.”

You let that hang for a moment, then pick up your jaw. 

“I,” you declare, “am  _not_ writing that down.”

And you throw a pillow at him.


End file.
